More than one birthday

I t took too long for the big green and yellow - and sometimes, red - blob to stop hovering off Nantucket's eastern shore and disappear across the ocean. For most of the week, it looked like the sun dance effort was a bust. All the weather predictions showed were tears.

Then Monday afternoon, following an early rainstorm and some lingering clouds, the sun broke through and it became as gorgeous as it gets. A Carolina blue sky ran from horizon to horizon and the sun shone with a ferocity that we have missed for many moons.

Now there is a pretty decent forecast out there for the 4th of July weekend and people seem to have sensed it even ahead of the professional prognosticators. They are coming. Town is humming for a change and some people are even walking around carrying shopping bags. This is our lifeblood. It is good to see signs that it is starting to pump again.

This July 4 will be the 233rd birthday of the United States. That is a long time, although only half as long as the time experts predict that Nantucket - or what is left of it - will finally slip beneath the waves. Since none of us should be too worried by that, we can devote this weekend to celebrating a country, however imperfect, that has survived the test of time and tide.

Our track record as a nation is pretty remarkable. It has survived despite a horrendous Civil War, unique in that it was more about money than power; despite a heterogeneity that in most cultures leads to tribal warfare and, despite its unrelenting practice of electing, from time to time, some of the most incompetent leaders imaginable.

That survival is indeed a cause for celebration.

Speaking of celebration, there is, or should be, another such occasion upon us. 1659 was a pretty important year in the life of Nantucket. It was in that year that the seven original proprietors took title to the island from Thomas Mayhew and, landing just down the road at Warren's Landing - perhaps the one and only time that the West End has been deemed important by anyone who is not from there - came to Nantucket to live.

So 2009 is not just the 233rd birthday of the United States, it marks the 350th anniversary of the white settlement of Nantucket. Obviously, that is a milestone worth noting, is it not? Or, is it? Has anyone noticed? Where are the parades, the races, the beard growing contest, the watermelon eating competition that marked the last big milestone for the island, the 300th in 1959? Who has taken charge and pronounced this the time to proclaim our settlement's longevity far and wide?

As best can be determined, no one. 'Tis a pity. What a wonderful opportunity lost. People love parties and Nantucket has blown perhaps the only opportunity in the first half of the 21st century to give itself one heck of a shindig and invite its friends from all over the world to come and celebrate with us. (The descendants of Thomas Macy, the de facto leader of the proprietors, are having a private reunion. Someone was thinking!)

We can't look back though, we can only look forward. The people who do make it for the 351st will be able to confirm that they are here by looking up from almost anywhere and seeing "Nantucket" painted on the new water tower. Those revelers may well walk on the re-laid sidewalk on Main Street after the smooth new bricks are replaced with the rough old ones. So it is that we can take comfort from the fact that the visitor will not see through the veneer of "authenticity" to the teacher's aide who lost her job or the mosquito control program that was dumped or the shorter library hours because the money used to paint the sign or re-lay the sidewalk wasn't available for something important.

We will undoubtedly survive such missteps, as our forefathers have before us. That's a part of what celebrating 233 years of this great country and 350 years of this special island is all about. I

The "Lighthouse Keeper" reflects the views of the author and does not necessarily represent the editorial position of The Nantucket Independent. drake@nantucketindependent. com.