The best thing about July, it sometimes seems to me, is that it is not yet August and all of those weeks of summer are stretched out ahead like a lazy line of turtles on a log. Usually, a negative compliment like “not yet August” would be some kind of slight, either to July or August. But it is not. It’s just a pure statement of fact: the beginning of summer is better than its end, even accounting for the truth that most of the year-round population rarely has time to exhale until September.

So enough already of the usual wistful, crypto-nostalgic, nothing is sweeter than a late summer late afternoon on the porch hooey. Save it for next month. Or better yet for September. Or never.

No. July – right now – is the time to pick up a sandwich somewhere and hit the beach. Or the boat. Or the trail. I don’t care what beach; whichever one you like to go to. Whichever one you can talk your fancy friends into unlocking for you. Whichever one is right down at the end of your road, or across your pond. Whichever one you usually don’t get to until August, in time to say: “What happened to July?”

So blah blah blah already about all the little chores around the house. The stuff that’s always cracking or peeling or leaking or growing weeds. Mildew? I don’t relish being the one to tell you, but if you don’t get some sun and wind on your skin, brothers and sisters, there is going to be some mildew growing in places you really won’t like. Like between your ears. Gutters? You should have done all that stuff in June, and now that this June’s gone you’ll have all of next June to do it. You’re lucky to be in that house on Martha’s Vineyard, so get out of it already and go eat the best lobster roll on the Island. Go get a slice of the best pizza. Eat some of the best fried clams. Lick a cone.

You say the best food is on your own porch? We have thousands of votes that say you’re wrong, and to doubt the voters is un-American, which is un-July. And didn’t we already agree that it is July? So why would you want to be un-July? You don’t want to be an oxymoron. Think about that while you unpack the Island’s best breakfast sandwich.

At least, all of the above is what I am telling myself this summer. I’m going to take as much time as I need to remember that I have all the time in the world to enjoy the best of the Vineyard all summer long, before it’s too late and summer is over all over again. It’s July; it’s early summer; there’s still time to do everything.

There’s still time, too, by the way, for all good Vineyarders to come to the aid of their coastal ponds. But not as much time as you might think. Read Alex Elvin’s report on the challenges facing the Lagoon, which starts on page sixty-four. It’s a sobering wake-up call. For all of the all-American money that has been made over the past few decades building new houses, big and small, all over the Island, there also has been an unseen reckoning flowing slowly but relentlessly underground. The bill is past due, and the sooner we begin to pay it down, the less it will ultimately be.

Which is one more reason you should go to the beach: you won’t be at home over-fertilizing your inappropriate lawn or, er, utilizing your septic system.