The whole social-media dance has gone on for a long time now but, given its growth and its impact on the world in which we live, it seems well past time for me to get with the program. I use a Mac for work and read and write emails all day, every day, but beyond that I really have not participated in the revolution in how people communicate with each other.

When my eldest granddaughter, who at that time already had an iPhone, started using Instagram at the age of about 12 or 13, I wondered what the world was coming to: Wasn’t she too young? When some years later my youngest granddaughter, barely 9 years old this summer, tried to set me up on Instagram, I smiled benignly but ignored the whole thing. By then, my daughter-in-law had started posting stories from The East Hampton Star on Facebook, and although I clicked occasionally to find out which stories were attracting notice, I didn’t pay much attention.

I do have a Facebook account, but I rarely look at it and have no idea how many Facebook “friends” I may have. I do know, however, that my husband has many more. He has always been gregarious, and seems to have “friended” all of my friends online, as well as his own. Without trying to, he has become my social-media social secretary. When I forget someone’s birthday, his Facebook alert, promptly relayed, allows me to remain in good stead. 

I can remember when the activists at Tiananmen Square got news from the outside world via fax. More recently, the Arab Spring, another kind of revolution, was sparked by activism on social media. ISIS uses Facebook and other platforms (hey, at least I know some of the lingo) to spread hatred and recruit young men and women from the West. You can’t pick up a copy of The New York Times without finding articles about hacking and cyber war that often go right over my head and, I assume, many people of my generation. 

And then, of course, we have Donald Trump, with his addled talk of “the cyber.” I have read that, incredibly, he is even more behind the times than I am when it comes to computer literacy. Reportedly, he didn’t own a computer until about 2007, and his real estate business still uses a Windows operating system from 2003. But isn’t it fitting that he has embraced Twitter as his own favorite means of mass-communication, given his accusation that traditional media are part of a giant, secret conspiracy against him? (A news-media conspiracy that, by the way, the Illuminati or the “international bankers” or whoever else it is who is supposed to be running it have completely forgotten to tell me about.)

Not wanting to get left behind by history, I spent some time this morning trying to get up to speed on some relatively more up-to-date forms of social media. I came away with a list of the 12 most popular platforms in this country: In order, according to one source, they are Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, Google+, Tumblr, Vine, WhatsApp, Reddit, Flicker, and Pinterest. 

That’s too many for me to digest. Maybe one of our schools or libraries will take up the social media challenge by offering adult-ed courses for people like me. I would be the first to sign up.

In the meantime, I noticed an interesting headline on Google News this afternoon, from The Independent: “We Probably Just Heard a Message From Aliens, Scientists Say.” Apparently, extremely odd and inexplicable noises and modulations are emanating from a set of stars in deep space. 

I wonder if anyone will be offering a course in interplanetary communications one day soon? We’ve seen a lot of wonders in our lifetimes. If it all comes to pass, and our civilizations do make contact, I really have my fingers crossed that the first human being the aliens speak with at that intergalactic-introductions ceremony isn’t President Trump.

A lithe, strong man drove a Mack truck into the backyard on Tuesday, delivering a 30-yard Dumpster. I didn’t have a notion about what a 30-yard Dumpster was or how it would look, although we have had what I think is a 2-yard version in the yard for quite some time. 

Wishing my youngest grandchildren were around to see the driver maneuver, I stood watching and smiling as he got out of the truck, threw some detritus out of the way, and then turned the behemoth this way and that until he could lower the Dumpster to the ground. He was so efficient that he drove off before I could say thank you.

Stalwart Star readers may recall that we had a big yard sale not terribly long ago, with the objective of emptying the oldest part of our family barn so that it could be taken down, restored, and reassembled on the Mulford Farm — just across Main Street — by the East Hampton Historical Society. We’ve been anticipating this for some five years now, and are relieved that the time has finally come. The workmen say the barn will be gone by mid-October.

The barn has been the backdrop to our lives for as long as we can remember. It’s where we stored our old iceboats, ice skates, and hand-me-down antique wooden sleds; bicycles by the dozen, and the huge, stage-set holiday-parade floats that were built for The East Hampton Star over the years. More than one generation of teenager has hidden in the hayloft to do the secret things that teenagers do. Under the floorboards, long ago, my children found ancient marbles, lost by other children in the 1930s. Once, a horse lived in the lone stall, but nothing’s lived there in at least 50 years (unless you count castoff yard furniture). 

There must be an axiom to the effect that empty spaces always fill up. It’s entropy, I guess: Not everything went at the barn sale, and some of the clumsiest and heaviest things — including an old wood and coal-burning Kalamazoo kitchen stove, last used in the 1970s by my late mother-in-law, and some huge old barrels — haven’t yet found a home. In the meantime, various other bits and bobs of furniture have drifted in. 

The barn is said to be the only one left in the village that not only has its original huge beams but has not been reconfigured in any way. Its time is now or never: The roof has a swayback, and the shingles are a disgrace. My daughter has vaguely suggested that perhaps we should throw a goodbye square dance in the barn, for sentimental reasons, but I’m not at all sure the floor is sound enough for that. The family is delighted that it will be preserved, of course, but I have to admit I hadn’t quite come to grips with how much work bidding it goodbye would take on our end. 

The historians at the society call it “the Hedges barn,” because it was built by that family, although it has been in the Edwards-Rattray family for around a century, as far as I know. E.J. Edwards, my grandchildren’s great-great-grandfather, opened Edwards Lane — a narrow drive that runs between the library and the Star office building — in the early 20th century and moved the barn from its site near Main Street to where it sits today. Another, newer section of the barn was constructed in the decades that followed, but the historical society isn’t taking that (and I am rather hoping it will be able to absorb some of the remaining items that will now need a new home). 

Over the next two weeks, various family members will haul out what remains, and cart the best of it to new homes: a 1950s linoleum-topped kit­chen table, a glass-front cabinet with peeling veneer, various huge trunks, fishing tackle. . . . Maybe we can convince the historical society to take a barrel or farm implement or two. 

Does anyone know anyone who would want to restore a wood-and-coal stove? It’s yours, if you can cart it.

With my kids in school once again and summer’s end this week, I have had a nagging sense of urgency about getting everything in. 

Adelia, the oldest, has been away at boarding school since before Labor Day, and, anyway, for her, summer was all about hanging out with friends when she was not working in a juice shop in town. She is a teenager but not old enough to have a driver’s license, which meant her interactions with her parents centered mostly on getting her to and from places, as opposed to sharing activities. 

I tell parents of younger children how soon it will be that their babies will be ready to learn from the world rather than from them. For the most part, they react with disbelief. No matter; they will learn soon enough that by the time their children are 14 or so, much of our work already will have been done. I see this now with Evvy, who is 12 and becoming rapidly more independent, though she still howls from upstairs when she is thirsty and needs a drink of water, for example.

Ellis, at 6, can read and do all sorts of things for himself, but he is still at an age during which his parents are the largest part of his universe. While Adelia is off at school doing who knows what with her friends and Evvy is in her room working on a craft project, Ellis is still willing to do things with me, like go fishing. And that gives me endless pleasure. Sunday was a day to get out on the boat together, and we invited my old friend Geoff Morris along. 

Geoff and I had been out at Gardiner’s Island the day before, tangling with false albacore and then porgy fishing. He had caught two very small sand sharks, which, after I made my report at home, drove Ellis nuts. He had to catch one of his own, which he did the following day.

The strong west wind that morning compelled us to motor up into the lee of the bluffs at Cedar Point, where we drifted out successively toward deeper water. Ellis got his shark and a number of porgies, though all the big ones that we had found earlier in the season appeared to have moved on. 

It was a successful day, but for me as a dad, the best thing was when Ellis said he wanted to do it again tomorrow.

I never quite realized I was one of those people who loves throwing things out. When I was growing up, I had this relative who enjoyed “chucking” this and that — that’s how she would refer to it. It always seemed so odd to me that she seemed to get a euphoric feeling just by placing something she considered a piece of garbage in the trash. Euphoria might not be quite how I would describe it, but, damn, purging does feel good. 

While I am not a fan of clutter, I am a bit nostalgic, so I am a bit surprised by my recent need to get rid of what I just do not need. 

In recent weeks, I have been tossing the never used, no longer needed, worn out, meaningless, and downright junky items I seem to have collected over the years. Candles that have become dust collectors, workout gear not part of my routine, and old makeup are just some of the items that have found their way into a Dumpster. I had enough vases, saved from floral deliveries, that I could have started my own flower shop. Why did I hold onto two baskets that would be perfect for an Easter egg hunt if I had children? Shoes that are no longer my style and a mound of T-shirts I received from my various races were all donated, of course. 

Despite my lack of abilities and plain disinterest in cooking, the kitchen was a treasure trove of trash: stained potholders and aprons, chip­ped dishes, a plethora of containers, many without the right-size lids or lids without the right-size containers. I got a bit angry when I came across parts of the ice cream maker, once used. I wanted to give it away to someone who might appreciate it, but with the main container missing, I chucked it. A week later I found the part in the freezer, in plain view. 

What about the CD collection? My husband wanted to know. No one listens to CDs anymore, he said. I told him most are classics, mostly ’90s hip-hop. Nas’s “Illmatic” and Lil’ Kim’s “Hard Core” got packed up carefully for our upcoming move. He thinks I will be carrying those boxes. 

I have a pile of old letters and cards that I kept for one reason or another. I started paring this down too. It was time for some letters from an old flame to go and also some birthday cards that I couldn’t figure out why I had kept. There were some I couldn’t give up: some notes from my parents, a birthday card from my grandmother (nothing special, but it was the last she sent), a thank-you note from a patient. I came across a nice surprise when I found a card from my friend Amy’s mother that she had sent when my grandmother passed away suddenly. She and I had only met that very weekend, but she was just that kind of lady. I texted Amy a photo of it. “How great is that?” she wrote back. Her mother has been gone six months now. 

So, yes, many things remain, but I think I’m getting better at identifying what’s truly meaningful. The rest I can chuck. 

Taylor K. Vecsey is The Star’s digital media editor. 

What makes you choose chicken noodle soup rather than gazpacho when they appear next to each other at your favorite takeout shop? Is it mood or weather? One is the quintessential comfort food, the other somehow jaunty and zingy, bringing to mind an artists’ lunch under an arbor in Andalusia. Both soups were on a refrigerator shelf at Breadzilla earlier this week, which may have indicated either that the cooks, arriving in the kitchen that morning, decided to hedge their bets on the weather, or that they might share the ambivalence some of us feel about September. 

The crowds and the mayhem are gone, at least on weekdays. We’re all walking around congratulating one another on having survived the invasion of the August People. Sunny September afternoons are perfect for all those things you couldn’t find time to do during the summer, like browsing through the Bargain Box or dead-heading the last of the roses. An added bonus are cooler nights, good for sleeping. On the other hand, September is the start of the hurricane season, as evidenced by Hermine just last week. This month can either feel like the end of something (fleeting summers, and winter drawing near) or like a new beginning (that start-of-the-school-year mood that lasts many decades after our own schooldays are over).

On the morning I chose chicken noodle soup over gazpacho — casting a vote for autumn, as it were — Hillary Clinton was resting at home, having been felled by pneumonia. It’s entirely possible that I went for the chicken soup subconsciously, as I was feeling rather sorry for her and afraid that a common illness like pneumonia could set back her campaign and wind up having a negative effect on her chances of winning the presidency. Hillary could use some soup. She seems like a soup person. 

Donald Trump’s favorite foods, I read, are Filet-o-Fish sandwiches from McDonald’s and Diet Coke. I’ll leave you to ponder that a moment.

Later in the week I went to the Iacono Farm on Long Lane to buy some chicken and found myself telling Eileen Iacono that my grandmother, who was from the old country, alarmed me as a child when I saw her throw chicken feet into the soup pot, claws and all. She told me they were needed to thicken the broth and said I shouldn’t worry because they had been scrubbed. I checked this information out with Mrs. Iacono, who must surely be a chicken-soup expert, and she nodded in affirmation. 

I can’t think of any other food with as meritorious a reputation as chicken soup. Science says it’s not just good for the soul, it can help you heal from a head cold. 

Still thinking about Mrs. Clinton and her need for a hot bowl of chicken soup, I went looking for the origin of the phrase “a chicken in every pot,” which I understood was political. The phrase sometimes has been attributed to Herbert Hoover, the 31st president of the United States, who took office in 1929 just as the Depression got under way. Although government policies that preceded him contributed to the crash, Hoover was blamed for the nation’s suffering and roundly defeated by Franklin Roosevelt four years later.

 A “Vote for Hoover” advertisement for his re-election described his administration as having “restored financial confidence and enthusiasm, changed credit from a rich man’s privilege to a common utility. . . .” It also claimed “Republican prosperity has . . . silenced discontent, put the proverbial ‘chicken in every pot,’ and a car in every backyard, to boot.” What shall we do if Trump is elected, and the stock markets — as predicted — take a hasty dive? A Filet-o-Fish on every fork?

The editorial staff at The Star, who share the responsibility of gathering information for and writing obituaries, consider it a high calling. It has been our mission to portray each life of someone in this community as fully as possible, and, over the years, our obituaries — be they of a person of renown or someone known only to those near to them — have achieved significant recognition. We feel bad if we are unable to present a decent portrait of someone who has lived among us and died. 

Novice reporters often have to steel themselves when making phone calls to the bereaved, afraid to intrude or say the wrong thing, but the discomfort is usually only on their end: A family member or friend is often quite comfortable answering questions, and even gratified to share memories and let the world know more.

One of the challenges of obituary-writing is that the cause of death has traditionally been a basic element that must be included in the story, and that discussion can be a tricky one. Sometimes a reference to no more than a short or long illness suffices; at other times an immediate cause, such as an accident, is necessary. As a matter of journalistic ethics, we cannot simply leave out a cause of death, in most instances, but the extent to which it is described publicly depends on how the bereaved feel about it. They may not want it known when the cause of death is suicide or, more commonly, an unusual illness. I’ve been around long enough to remember when some families felt there was a stigma attached to admitting that someone had died of cancer. The more recent tendency to avoid acknowledging Alzheimer’s or AIDS — yes, sadly, still — seems to have eclipsed that concern.

But when is it appropriate to leave out a cause of death of someone who was among the very elderly? That is another delicate issue. Writing that someone died of “natural causes” is a clichéd and rather euphemistic way of avoiding the words “old age.” The latter doesn’t sound very nice, though, does it? 

Some members of the staff think all we have to do is choose an age, 90, for example, after which it is no longer necessary to include the cause of death. I argue otherwise. I reply that I have a 92-year-old friend who is more robust than I, and that it would be unfortunate to simply assume her cause of death was no longer a part of her life story.

The advent of technology has had a salutary effect on all this. Many people find it a bit easier to commit information to a computer and it send along via email, rather than in conversation. We also send out a form that helps organize the task for anyone who asks. There are pitfalls to this updated process, of course: Once a family member or friend has put a life into words, in filling out this form, they are not always pleased to see their words altered or paraphrased during the editing process (as a life story is made to conform to the necessary rules governing newspapering).

What I want to tell you is that we do our best when writing obituaries, and I hope to encourage people to feel free to provide as many details as they wish when telling us about a life lost. We, all of us, lead lives of richness and interest; there’s no such thing as an average life. All this is worth thinking about, I believe; after all, we will all be among those on the pages, someday.

Had I met Larry Brown at the pickup games the other night, I would, had I not been barred at the gates — “No media,” they said, though, looking about, it seemed I was the sole medium around — have told him that were he to coach here I intended to become the legal guardian of our 10 and 7-year-old basketball-crazed grandsons who live in Perrysburg, Ohio.

The more the merrier, I say. After all, we’ve got a puppy who, in dog terms, will approach their ages in little more than a year. It would enliven the house, whose upstairs, while beautifully appointed now, is unoccupied. And there’s a Ping-Pong table in the basement that’s looking lonely.

Puppies keep you on your toes, and so do grandchildren. It occurs to me, however, that it will be hard to train O’en out of jumping up if Jack and Max, in going for the hoop, which, of course, we’d put outside, are always doing so.

A friend of my daughter’s, one who’s around my age, told Emily during a recent visit to Sewickley, Pa., that her kids reminded her of me at their age, though while I can lay claim to having been as athletic (my mother said I was running at 9 months), they, as I think is the case with all eight of my grandchildren, are smarter. I can do letters, but not numbers, which, of course, is why I was entrusted to do the budget stories for this paper in the past, and why I’m wondering if I’ve counted correctly. A ninth grandchild — I think I have it right — is to arrive in February.

The puppy has already outgrown the crate we had, and in bringing a bigger one upstairs this morning — on loan from a co-worker, Kathleen— I said to Greg, who was helping me, that O’en might be easier to look after in the office than at home — because we hadn’t taught him to read yet. 

Seriously, if Larry Brown becomes East Hampton High’s boys basketball coach, won’t this place become a lodestone for young relations, however distant the bloodline and however far-flung, who love shooting hoops?

The dribbling tide might put a strain on the school systems, but it could well revivify East Hampton’s aging population. It would get the blood flowing again.

Or maybe puppies alone will suffice.

David Brooks wrote the other day about the lack of trust in our society, and how corrosive that is when it comes to a thriving democracy.

I would like to offer our puppy, O’en (that’s how Mary, who named him, has chosen to spell Owen), as a paradigmatic example of democratic interaction. I’ve never seen a dog so at ease with others, whether they be four or two-legged. While admittedly he can sometimes overreach when it comes to the intimacy that the essayist urges upon us — Mary has the nip marks on her ankles and wrists to prove it — O’en has already, only nine weeks into his life, cut rather a fine figure here at The Star.

What was it Pericles said in speaking of Athenian democracy? “We make friendships not by receiving kindness from others but by conferring it on others.” And that’s the way it’s been with O’en. He confers licks upon one and all without prejudice, so that his admirers, in turn, become more inclined to confer kindnesses upon others — and freely, so that the recipients do not think of them as in any way burdensome, as debts to be paid. 

O’en is not an isolationist, he welcomes all comers, he is an eager participant in a free and open society, collegial, an ideal democrat. O’en for all, and all for O’en, we like to say. 

Yes, he is not yet entirely apprised of the laws that strengthen our way of life and whose purpose is to extend fair play to all, though, if truth be told, that is largely owing to the fact that his owners, whose brains have atrophied somewhat over the years, need more training than he.

And, wonderful to tell, there is someone, Matty Posnick, who can provide that guidance, at weekly puppy kindergarten classes at ARF that we’ve begun to attend. These sessions are pure joy, whether the attendees are at work or at play. His instructions, designed to create a more perfect union between owners (O’eners, in our case) and their pets, Mary and I have come to view, in toto, as “The Gospel According to St. Matty.”

When Matty speaks, we sit. And listen, and learn, and grow.

We’re growin’ O’en.

Standing on the ocean beach in Montauk with East Hampton Town Supervisor Larry Cant­well on Tuesday, the question was why the downtown waterfront strip is the way it is. High waves from Hermine, a post-tropical cyclone by the time it passed Long Island last week, had eaten away almost all the fill that a United States Army Corps of Engineers contractor had placed there in the spring. As we looked over the damage, Larry pointed out that the sand level was more or less back where it had been when the corps project began.

The idea behind the $9.8 million undertaking was to bolster the shoreline for a time in the hope that the Army Corps would return some day with a more permanent solution. Now, it seems that is not going to happen. The corps has said it will commit only to putting more sand on the beach every four years. This is, of course, demonstrably idiotic — the work its contractor finished just in June is already beginning to fail.

But the failures go back much further than the Army Corps, in fact, to the earliest days of Montauk’s development. In the 1920s, Carl Fisher had grand plans for a “distinguished summer colony on the slender tip of Long Island.” Plans called for a boardwalk the length of the downtown, but even Fisher and his big dreams showed a bit of sense where the shore was concerned. 

An artist’s rendering of what was to come had little in the way of buildings along the ocean beach itself and most of the substantial structures well inland. This restraint may have stemmed from personal experience. Fisher’s properties in Florida took heavy damage from a hurricane in 1926, a storm that was credited with ending a real estate boom that had been running for several years. On the other hand, since it was believed at the time that devastating hurricanes did not reach Long Island, Fisher might have thought Montauk development was a safer bet.

Financial troubles ended Fisher’s plans here, and the stock market crash and Great Depression more or less froze Montauk in time. Then the 1938 Hurricane rolled across Long Island on Sept. 21 of that year, as if to emphasize that development on the shore made no sense. The lesson was forgotten a generation later.

By the early 1960s, building returned to the oceanfront in Montauk and along the length of Long Island. People forgot the obvious: that erosion was inevitable. Local and state government stood by as scores of houses, motels, and other buildings were placed exactly where they should not have been. This is evident when you stand on the Montauk beach today.

The question, going forward, is whether anyone from Washington to Town Hall has the ability to guide us to a sensible step back. Managed retreat, they call it, but so far, those are just words.

Why are there Russian teenagers wearing $700 down parkas on the popcorn line at the East Hampton Cinema?

I walked over to the movie theater on Main Street the other night thinking about high blood pressure, and how I ought to exercise more, and nearly blew a gasket when the ticket-taker told me he had to search my bag. 

“Are you serious?” I asked. “What for?” 

“For guns,” he said, gesturing like his hand was a pistol: “Guns.” 

“Are you serious?” 

I turned from the ticket-taker to the suited guy in the booth for confirmation. “Is he serious?” 

“He’s serious. It’s company policy.” 

The ticket-taker poked around in my floral cinch-top bucket bag for a concealed weapon. “Not guns here, so much, but guns other places,” he said. “It’s Regal Cinema’s national policy.” 

“Really?” I said, looking pointlessly around at the Russian teenagers for sup port. “I’m still upset that you don’t sell Peanut Chews anymore — and now you have to search our bags for guns?” 

The man in the ticket booth gave a quizzical nod of empathy. 

I continued to protest: “I’m still upset that when you phone 324-0448 you don’t hear the recorded movie times anymore . . . and now you’re searching our bags for guns?” The guy in the booth shrugged, gave a weak smile, and turned away. 

Obviously, they are not as sentimental as I am at the East Hampton Cinema about phone numbers and Peanut Chews. I moved home from Nova Scotia last year, after seven or eight living in Canada, and have spent the last 18 months complaining about changes around town, much to the irritation of my children. 

I feel like Rip Van Winkle. 

What happened to the red rosebushes on the fence at Odd Fellows Hall (a.k.a. Gordon Peavy’s dance studio, a.k.a. Eileen Fisher)? How did they become so meager?

The matching, velvety-red roses on the fence at the train station? I can guess what happened to those ones: The evergreens someone planted to “beautify” the space parallel to the platform grew so tall while I was away in Canada that the rosebushes no longer get enough sun. The train-station-fence roses are a frail shadow of their former glory. Who is in charge of the roses? Can I write a letter to someone?

When did people start calling the East Hampton Town Board the “town council”?

Am I the only one who is unhappy with the newfangled Halloween ritual of marching children store to store for trick-or-treating instead of letting them run (somewhat) wild and (relatively) unchaperoned through darkened neighborhoods?

I have accustomed myself to the sight of the men and women in pseudo-Moroccan caftans or Vilebrequin swim trunks who whiz down the street on bicycles or skateboards as they simultaneously fiddle with their phones, eyes down, but I do worry I will run one of them over with my car.

The parking lots at the ocean beaches this summer were, predictably, even more crowded than they were eight years ago, but, weirdly, the water was emptier. Why aren’t there more swimmers? Do people only swim in pools nowadays?

Furthermore, where is the white corn?

Winston Churchill — supposedly — said, “If you’re not a liberal when you’re 25, you have no heart. If you’re not a conservative by the time you’re 35, you have no brain.” I have to admit I must be middle-aged now. I will never be conservative politically, but I’m a radical conservative when it comes to preservation of any sort, even of things like Peanut Chews, the natural-born right of Americans to jaywalk, and telephone area codes.

I’d like to turn back time to the summers when small children didn’t wear string bikinis. A functional one-piece maillot or, for the very-very young, just running naked at the beach was better. The weekend after Labor Day, I saw a mite of about 5 or 6 wearing tiny bikini bottoms with no top other than a peekaboo white-crochet halter: the Kim Kardashian look for the kindergarten set.

Does this make me a curmudgeon?

The caste system out here has definitely gotten more entrenched — the class divide more shocking — since I left the country in 2009. I mean, have you ever seen so many Maseratis in your life? Are all these new Euro summer people shipping them over for the season on freighters, or what? My children, in July, took to counting them as we sat in traffic, en route to day camp: two Maseratis where the bowling alley used to be, a vintage DeLorean near where the horses used to graze at Hardscrabble, a Bugatti here, a Lamborghini there. . . .

In a Sag Harbor home-goods store, a few weeks ago, I noticed a set of highly expensive throw pillows with screen prints of Masai warriors’ faces as a decorative motif. People’s exoticized “ethnic” likenesses as an interior-decoration pattern: That’s not just bad taste, that’s a whole other level of . . . something not good. Obtuseness about our own privileges, maybe?

Because I cannot end this short essay on a grinch-like note, I will now press myself to admit that not all the changes I’ve noticed since my return home are entirely bad. Some of them are actually good.

I’m glad the public in general is finally talking about beach-access rights.

And our food, for instance, has gotten even better. It’s spectacular, really. Farm stands have proliferated; that’s beautiful to see. I cannot understand who is buying $10 single servings of bottled juice at Citarella — 10 dollars? really? for a single-serve watermelon juice? — but I practically swooned when I found smoked, locally caught bluefish salad in Amagansett not long ago.

True, I haven’t heard the cry of a single whippoorwill since I got back from Canada, but there were far more fireflies flashing and beaming in my yard all August than there ever were before. The pleasant chorus of insects at night is far, far louder than it used to be, too — are those cicadas?

I can’t get behind the chic-ifying of the Old Stove Pub, but I’m so glad the luncheonette at the Poxabogue golf course hasn’t changed, and that the Candy Kitchen in Bridgehampton hasn’t changed an iota, either. The only thing at the Candy Kitchen that has altered over the last decade is the ketchup dispenser: It used to be the pointy-ended squeeze-bottle kind, with which you could apply a smiley face to your hamburger patty. Do you remember? The squeeze bottle. I miss that.

Bess Rattray is a freelance writer and editor for The Star’s East magazine whose work has appeared in Vogue, Vogue.com, Bookforum, ELLE, and Salon.com.