I like Jay Schneiderman. We go way back. I first met him when he was chairman of the East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals and I was assigned to the beat. We have kids roughly the same age. I figure his heart is in the right place. But if there is any other local politician now who slings as much jive, I don’t know who that is.

Case in point: About three weeks ago, I was asked to do a cameo appearance at a forum at the Parrish Art Museum called “Can This Town Be Saved?” At the outset, the moderator, Maziar Behrooz, warned that it wasn’t going to be saved that night. The audience, about 80 people, laughed. Jay, a Suffolk legislator now, was one of the panelists, with Filipe Correa, who is an accomplished urban planner, architect, and Harvard assistant professor. I was brought in to provide some population numbers, which led to a bunch of work that will eventually become a story for The Star.

During a question-and-answer period, a member of the audience asked about climate change and sea level rise and if East End governments were paying attention. Jay, a former Montauker who is running somewhat implausibly for Southampton Town supervisor, leaned in toward the microphone. Then he said something to the effect that the County Legislature was talking about it every day. He went on in this vein for a while.

Standing off to the side at a lectern, I resisted the urge to laugh and searched my recollection. Could there have been some initiative I missed? Jay mentioned having a hand in the money to elevate Dune Road in Southampton; I think that was about it.

Fact is, no one is doing much of anything, from East Hampton to New York City Hall. Albany wonks have produced a couple of highly detailed studies filled with recommendations, but they have not been taken up by any of the communities The Star covers. There is a whole lot of talk, but next to no action. Building goes on in danger zones near the bays and oceans. Questionable infrastructure investments continue to be made despite clear indications that the water is coming. And East Hampton’s supposedly binding waterfront plan designed almost 20 years ago to control coastal development is largely ignored.

In East Hampton, Mr. Schneiderman had his chance as a two-term supervisor to get something meaningful going. He did not. In fact, the only town official of our memory to even suggest that major shifts had to come soon was Bill McGintee, and you know what happened to him.

The other day, Hillary Clinton released a climate change plan calling for substantial increases in renewable energy with the goal of reducing global warming, and by extension, sea level rise. It’s a starting point, but local governments shouldn’t just wait around for help from Washington. And officials, even those running for office, shouldn’t be tolerated when they paper over the fact that so far, nothing has really been done.

“The fields are alive with the sound of athletes,” I sang, in my best Julie Andrews imitation, to Mary, who was happy the other day to hear it.

Girls and boys were playing soccer, and the football team was doing agility drills on the turf, and on the varsity baseball diamond it was East Hampton versus East Hampton — Vinnie Alversa’s gray team against Brian Turza and Mike Rodriguez’s maroons.

Alversa said that perhaps it’s been a dozen years since East Hampton had Senior (13-to-15-year-old) League teams. I don’t think I recall East Hampton High’s fields being so intensely used in the summertime. And that’s not to mention that three softball teams of seventh-through-12th graders, got together by Jason Biondo and Rich Swanson, are playing each other at East Hampton’s Herrick Park Tuesday and Thursday evenings. Or that cross-country runners meet at the track every Tuesday evening with John Conner, a former age-group recordholder in the mile.

When at a recent school board meeting Jim Nicoletti said he feared that the Bonac athletic program was, for various reasons, in a bad way, I worried that I might not have much to attract my attention hereafter. Nicoletti, to underline his case, had pointed out, for one, that three varsity coaches had been ousted as the result of parent-spearheaded drives that had outflanked the athletic director in the past 18 months, and that, consequently, at least some young teachers were reluctant to give coaching a try until tenure were accorded them.

He added, moreover, that the administration had in some cases he knew of passed over Bonac-born-and-bred applicants who had returned here to teach, and that given the fact most teachers now live up the Island, it stood to reason they would want to leave at 3 p.m. rather than coach a team.

And yet there is this seeming renaissance of sorts that greeted my eyes the other day. . . .

Obviously, inasmuch as it constitutes a great part of my life, I hope the ship of sport here will be righted. I’ve not had much of a spring in my step the past three springs. It hasn’t just been softball, but baseball and lacrosse as well.

It’s not so much the winning (though that is nice) I yearn for — it’s a competitive spirit. The Pierson girls basketball players had it, though they weren’t world-beaters. They — at least in the game I saw in Bridgehampton’s gym — were fiery and scrappy. What most spectators want to see is a good game. What most players want is a good game.

May we field teams again who, win or lose, give their opponents good games.

I imagine few people end their summers in the Hamptons without at least a couple of good tales to tell.

My own stories started in 1989 when I was 8 years old and my family began taking summer trips to the South Fork. Back then, my first time parasailing in Montauk began to cultivate in me a thirst for adventure that later led to a hang gliding excursion in North Carolina’s Outer Banks and skydiving on the coast of California. I’ve taken in my share of really awesome music at the Stephen Talkhouse over the years, and this one time a friend and I saw a beached whale, but I’ll admit I passed my 20s without ever experiencing the Boardy Barn.

I live out here now, and I’ve got a new story to tell.

It begins at Guild Hall, where I took in my first show a couple of weeks ago. It was called WordTheatre, and the premise was famous actors performing dramatic readings of award-winning short stories and poetry, produced and directed by oneof the foremost voiceover talents in show business. With some of the stories’ award-winning authors present in the audience, including Richard Bausch, Andre Dubus III, and Peter Orner, I got the sense that the whole production — which was a benefit for the prestigious Pushcart Prize — had accomplished something really profound and authentic. It was spectacular and intimate at the same time. The fangirl in me would have been satisfied with snapping selfies with a few of my favorite actresses after the show. That happened, but the story doesn’t end there.

Somehow, after the show, a friendly conversation with some of the behind-the-scenes folks yielded an invitation to a post-show gathering at the home of Philip Spitzer, the literary agent, who has a house in East Hampton. The authors were to be present, and if there’s one thing I love more than a good movie or theatrical show, it’s a good book. Midnight approached, but my fatigue dissipated and I graciously accepted the invitation.

The thing is, I’m an aspiring author myself. Maybe it was the cabernet sauvignon, but I started fantasizing that somehow I could absorb their language, their mannerisms, their own storytelling techniques, perhaps by way of osmosis if I was lucky or lazy or, more realistically, by observing, listening, and drawing some keen conclusions. Maybe that way, my own literary future could be as illuminated as theirs.

To be an author, it turns out, you don’t just have to be great at writing. You have to do it all the time. You also have to be a patient diplomat with the ability to endure readings where few people show up and take your reviews in stride. You’ve got to save your energy for when you’re writing your future best seller.

Apparently, you’ve got to be adept at practical jokes, too, and be able to deliver a good punch line with a straight face, which they did until nearly 2 o’clock in the morning. Regrettably, though, I was too captivated by them to be able to recall any of the jokes I like to tell, so I was unable to actually contribute to the impromptu comedy show transpiring in Mr. Spitzer’s torch-lit backyard. So I know I have a long way to go.

Earlier in the evening, I’d been introduced as a journalist who had penned a full-length novel that’s on the cusp of being published. And so, in a brief conversation near the end of the evening, one of the authors turned to me and said, “What’s your book about?” I stammered through a description.

“What’s it called?” Great title, he said. Use your own name, not a pen name, he advised. From another: Keep your day job until you’ve become well established, then keep it for a little while longer. Grateful for the words of encouragement, I thanked them and returned home, where I promptly drafted an entire outline for a new story I’d been thinking about lately.

If many stories conclude with a simple “the end” and that’s it, here’s hoping that this story is really only the beginning of something bigger.

Christine Sampson reports on education for The East Hampton Star.

Call me a tree hugger. I like deer. I even like the deer who bed down in a hedgerow between our house and the library, or across the lane in a bushy area between two neighbors’ houses, or at the far, overgrown side of the property, beyond the barn. (Yes, even I admit, there have been too many deer in the village, too many for comfort and too many for traffic safety, too.)

Regardless of the damage the deer had done to our garden, I had always been happy to watch their comings and goings, as they strolled or trotted across the yard, or, on occasion, settled down for a rest smack-dab in the middle of the lawn, as if they were in charge. I have been known to pride myself on not having put up elaborate deer fencing to keep them out. But then we decided to get a dog.  

Goodie — our late, lamented, last family dog — had been allowed to roam the neighborhood unsupervised, but times have changed. How long would a free-range dog live with traffic as crazy as it now is? How long has it been since that beloved, footloose basset hound (whose name I can’t recall, though I bet someone will write in to remind me) was the unofficial mayor of Newtown Lane? 

Once we had decided to get a dog, we had to face the reality that either we would need to take it out on a leash for regular walks or we would have to fence in our backyard. 

I admit I felt like a bit of a hypocrite when we decided on the latter. The modest, and all but invisible dark-wire fence we put up is only five feet high, but so far it has kept out the deer. I guess our particular deer aren’t up to scratch as jumpers. 

We are beginning to observe various old shrubs and flowers that had been fodder for the deer coming slowly back to life. A few very old rose bushes, I’m happy to report, are going to survive the deer-ravaging they had suffered over the last few years. I imagine that soon we’ll even be able to remove the protective wire barriers we had placed around the roses; maybe we’ll even plant some new ones.

 My friend Galen Williams, who has designed gardens here for decades, dropped by the other day and made note of the fact that tiny hosta leaves were poking up and daylilies trying to sprout. The daylilies had been totally devoured and had long since disappeared from view. The hostas, planted by a previous generation decades ago, used to surround the house in profusion, but ferns had taken their place in recent years. Now, I’m trying to give away ferns to any friends who would like transplants.

It seems amusing that, these days, the deer are free-range villagers and the dogs are captive, from Main Street to Northwest Woods. 

Sookie, our delightfully shaggy new mutt from the Animal Rescue Fund of the Hamptons, isn’t much of a barker, but she whines and barks excitedly — and dances on her hind legs like a circus dog — when she sees deer in the front yard, beyond the fence. Clearly, her heart’s desire is to escape and get at them. But she loves her backyard realm and hasn’t, at least so far, figured out that she probably could dig her way out if she put her mind to it. 

Will the deer stay away, or will they get hungry enough come fall to venture a leap over the fence? And, if they do leap across, will little Sookie’s bad-girl terrier displays chase them away again from the old roses? Only time will tell, but so far, the score is deer zero, dog one.

Jayma Cardoso, the owner of the Surf Lodge bar and restaurant in Montauk, went online last week and disputed a photograph that appeared on The Star’s website that showed several men urinating into Fort Pond. “All I see is a group of friends standing knee deep in the water,” she told our friends over at the always entertaining Curbed Hamptons. Giving her the benefit of the doubt, I figured I should check it out. So I talked for a second or third time to the staff member who brought us the photo in the first place.

She said that the source (whom it turned out I know and trust) wanted to remain anonymous due to his position in the community. He had observed the men begin to relieve themselves against the Surf Lodge bulkhead from the Industrial Road causeway and then grabbed his phone to record the moment. I have every reason to believe his account rather than the self-serving nonsense offered by the person most directly responsible — other than the pissers themselves.

But sometimes I think that the Surf Lodge is blamed too much for Montauk’s problems with bonkers nightlife — and public urination. Consider that on two separate Saturday mornings at about 6:30 I have gaped at organized bicycle outings of perhaps 20 riders stopping for a pee break at Georgica Beach. The  problem there is that the restrooms do not open until 9 a.m.

It is quite a sight, watching four, five, or more men emerge, pulling up their Spandex short fronts from behind the old Coast Guard building, where, presumably (I did not check this out) they’ve just let it flow into the grass. Making this more annoying, it is less than three miles from Georgica to the village’s privy in the Reutershan parking lot off Main Street; you would have thought these bonnie captains of industry could have held it until 7 a.m. when it opens.

The other morning when a friend and I were pulling into the lot at Georgica to check the surf, we saw one guy not even bothering to get off his bike peeing without a care in the world into the weeds and pine at the edge of the bicycle rack area. I had told my friend to expect this; he was not disappointed.

“You’re kidding me, man!” he exclaimed as we passed the dude.

It’s interesting how the story of the summer has been the summer itself. And it’s interesting how so many people, not just the Montauk nightlife knuckleheads of the sort most of us once avoided in high school, treat this place like their own personal bathroom. Um, excuse me, I have to step outside now.

Three of East Hampton’s most admired coaches of the past generation — Jim Nicoletti, Ellen Cooper, and Kathy McGeehan — appeared in wholehearted support of Lou Reale, the ousted championship and award-winning softball coach, at the school board’s organizational meeting on July 14 — Bastille Day.

And while the turnout for Coach Reale was impressive — there were upwards of 60 there — the battlements were in the end not stormed. (That the “pros” outweighed the “cons” by about 97 percent apparently failed to persuade.)

But at least the “mess” surrounding Coach Reale’s forced resignation, as one board member, John Ryan Sr., called it, had somewhat of an airing, in contrast to the usual the mute rubber-stamping by school boards of administrative decisions.

The superintendent, Rich Burns, said he had taken it upon himself to overturn the athletic director Joe Vas’s recommendation that the 20-year veteran be rehired after having been “inundated over the past month and a half” by Reale’s detractors and supporters.

(At one point, apparently, during that span, Mr. Burns said he would second Mr. Vasile-Cozzo’s recommendation, and then, apparently following further meetings with interested parties, decided he wouldn’t.)

The overwhelming turnout of the “pros” was interesting to me, for when I used to cover public hearings held by the town and village boards it was always the other way, with the antis’ numbers far exceeding the pros’. If the antis in this case felt so strongly, as Mr. Burns indicated they did, you would have thought they’d have shown up.

Coach Reale is still in the dark, as far as I know, as to all of the allegations made. At the very least, he ought to have been given a chance to respond to them by the superintendent, who at the meeting, with his lips pursed and his voice lowered, hinted that the partisans would change their tune if they knew what he knew.

As to allegations of “verbal abuse,” it seems strange that players dating to his early years here, players who presumably were subject to the same “abuse,” would come out to praise him.

Mr. Ryan, when asked the next day if he thought the board might override Mr. Burns — as apparently it can — said he didn’t think there was enough support, though he did not altogether rule out the possibility of an override, or the possibility of a vote on the matter that would put everyone on record.

One thing for sure, as Mr. Nicoletti said, the coaching situation here is in a perilous way, given the fact that on three occasions in the past 18 months — in the cases of R.J. Etzel, who had moved back here from Miami so that he could coach varsity baseball, Steve Redlus, the former varsity football coach, who had initially promised “a total rebuild” of that program, and now Coach Reale — the superintendent has effectively disempowered the A.D.

I doubt that it used to be this way. Mr. Nicoletti said he couldn’t remember similar instances in the past.

It’s as Hughie King has often said, “The inmates are running the asylum.”

A longtime member the Star staff who had a moderately bad day on Monday asked rhetorically whether someone could really go through a day at this time of year here without running into some kind of annoyance or obstacle. Short of never leaving the house or hiding out at work from dawn to after dark, at some point we all have to come into contact with the juggernaut that is the South Fork in high season.

For example, the other day, I thought I’d avoid the inevitable frustration of driving into East Hampton Village to go to the bank by taking the time to walk there from the office. But then, fording Main Street at the crosswalk near Huntting Lane, I took a little chin music — as the baseball term for a close, inside pitch goes — from an irrigation company truck whose driver neglected to stop. Crossing back was okay, but I had to walk a slalom course around two other pedestrians peering at their smartphones.

As things worked out, however, I did get a little quiet time that evening, running my powerboat around from the house to its slip in Three Mile Harbor. Lisa and the kids were at various places and I would not be needed for driving duty until 8 p.m. I had an infrequent hour and a half with absolutely nothing to do.

After lifting the anchor and stowing it on the 24-foot lobster boat, I floated on the wind awhile before even starting the motor, then ran roughly northwest toward Cartwright Island. I slowed where the incoming tide piled up on the shoals, where a day before I had seen two immature sooty terns, ararity here, picking at leaping bait. They had moved on.

There was one other boat in sight, fishing, from the looks of it, near Cartwright. I headed off to the north, catching and releasing a small bluefish in Cherry Harbor. After that, I kept the motor off and just sat.

Even on a still evening, like this was, you don’t hear much that far out in the bay. Sound carries, but once beyond a mile from the mainland, all you hear are the birds, the wind, and the slap of small waves against the hull. Had I not had to meet Lisa for a ride back to my car at the office, and then to collect one of the kids at a friend’s house, I might have stayed there all night.

Summertime,

And the livin’ ain’t easy,

Sirens are wailin’

And the prices are high

Oh, your daddy’s at Ditch

And your mom’s driving while texting

So hush little baby

Don’t you cry

One of these mornings

You’ll get your own iPhone

Then you will turn your face down

And forget the blue sky

But until that morning

There’s lots more to distract you

With Daddy at Ditch and Nanny standing by

Summertime,

And the stomach turns queasy

Fish are gaspin’

And the E. coli’s high

Your daddy’s bit by a tick

And your mamma ain’t cookin

So hush little baby

There’s always Wi-Fi

“Travailler, rien que travailler,” Rodin said to Rilke, and that is for the most part true. Work — at least work that you’re good at, and, one hopes, work that you like — is redeeming.

But some of us work too hard, and our health — it’s no surprise that it’s summer as I say this — suffers because of it. And so it was that one of my co-workers, Kathy Kovach, who has made me look good week after week, year after year, decade after decade, came fairly close to being carried away by pneumonia this past week.

Of course she wants to come back right away. You are the best, Kathy. Don’t get carried away. I hope you can live easy for a while. It’s summertime after all.

A phrase came to my mind last week. I have not thought of this phrase in the six years since I moved back here to the East End, and yet there it was, quite unexpectedly. Before I tell you the phrase I need to give you a bit of background.

I grew up here on the East End, in Montauk and East Hampton. I graduated from East Hampton High School. My father chose to live out here because of the surf, moving to Montauk in the late ’60s to raise a young family. Both my parents were “military brats,” and they spent their formative years living in Hawaii, where my dad met my mother and also learned “the sport of kings,” surfing. My parents owned the first surf shop in Montauk in the early ’70s called He’e Nalu, before its time, as my father often says.

Growing up, the television show “Magnum P.I.” was a weekly highlight in our household due more to the scenery of palm trees and aloha shirts than for Tom Selleck’s cultured mustache and sweet car. Our family took only one “big” holiday and that was to Hawaii for three weeks. I had just started 10th grade. I fell in love with the place and dreamed of going back.

After I graduated I did a short stint in the Marine Corps, and when I was 19 that dream became reality and I spent my first winter in Hawaii. I ended up spending the next 20 years living on the islands.

Hawaii is known as the Aloha State. Aloha literally means “breath of life.” Locals will say aloha as a greeting and as a farewell or goodbye. Aloha is a way of living and treating each other with love and respect. The spirit of aloha permeates the culture, and is a driving force in government, business, and everyday island life. Aloha can be conveyed from a distance by a smile and a “shaka” — the shaka more commonly known here on the mainland as the “hang loose” symbol, formed by closing the hand then sticking out the pinky and thumb, giving a slight wave.

As a newcomer to the islands, aside from the incredible colors and tropical fragrances, you may feel overwhelmed by the number and combinations of vowels in the names of places and streets. The Hawaiian alphabet contains five vowels (A, E, I, O, U), seven consonants (H, K, L, M, N, P, W), and the ’okina, which is a backward apostrophe and signifies a slight break in the sound. There are other small nuances but when you see a word such as “humuhumunukunuku’apua’a,” “kalanianiole,” or “Kawaihau,” I think you may get my point. My first reaction to these strange words was to make fun of them in my own form of Hawaiian speak, “hawakahakahikihikiho, wikiwikitikitiki.” My father reprimanded me, “Learn to say the words correctly!” This was my first important lesson in aloha.

As much as the spirit of aloha permeates the Hawaiian culture, there is a very strong sense of localism that can at times be extreme. The first time Capt. James Cook, credited with “discovering” the Hawaiian Islands for the Europeans, came ashore, his arrival was celebrated. Cook and his men were lavished with gifts of food, crops, livestock, and women. Upon his return to the islands he was bludgeoned to death before he reached dry sand.

There is a Hawaiian word that encapsulates this localism and brings me to the phrase that inspired this narrative. The word itself is “haole,” pronounced in pigeon form “how-lee,” which literally means “no breath.” Traditionally this word was used to describe those of European descent or foreigners. Haole can be used in merely a descriptive manner or can be used as an ethnic slur.

The word implies that the foreigner is ignorant to local ways and literally has no spirit. This is quite the antithesis of aloha.

What I learned in Hawaii, often called the melting pot of the Pacific, is, aside from blood lineage, being local is not so much measured by length of time or ownership of property but by the degree to which one assimilates the spirit of aloha. As a newcomer, aloha starts with humility and respect. Not just respect for others, but respect for the “ ’aina” (meaning land, pronounced “I-na”). An awareness of one’s surroundings and a big smile go a long way.

So, in the words of the hugest Hawaiian in a crowded surf lineup, the phrase that resurfaced in my mind was “F’ing haoles, beat it!”

Have an aloha day.

Matthew Charron is The Star’s digital imaging specialist.

The Hampton Jitney is a great leveler. Other than the media moguls and Russian oligarchs who come and go on private jets or noisy helicopters, most of us 99 percenters — when we eschew our own automobiles — are apt to find ourselves crowded into a true cross-section of East End residents and weekenders on the Jitney. And something crazy is always happening there, isn’t it?

I’ve been riding the bus since its first year of existence, and I’ve seen it all: fights between riders, quarrels between riders and attendants, even a rider booted from the bus and left by the side of the road by the old Grace’s Hot Dog truck. But the set-piece drama that played out when I was coming back from New York one recent afternoon really took the cake.

We had barely pulled away from 40th Street, and I had just picked up my Kindle, when my attention was drawn to a woman of a certain age sitting behind me who had started whispering.

My first thought was that she was rehearsing a script. There’s a lot of theater here at this time of year, after all, and it seemed to me that her conversation was somehow too clichéd, too Hollywood to be the stuff of real life. After several minutes of nosy-Parkering, however, it became clear that the truth was less glamorous: She was on the phone.

 Calls on the Jitney are supposed to take place only in emergencies and be limited to three minutes. You are advised to “let your fingers do the talking” (that is, text). The woman behind me was on the phone for almost the whole two-and-a-half hour ride. The attendant never seemed to notice.

Naturally, when someone starts whispering, one’s interest is piqued. Blatant attempts at secrecy only draw our interest more strongly. What can I say? I haven’t much excuse. Does it count that I’m a journalist and am supposed to be ever on the alert for news? No? Well, the fact is, I was losing interest in the book I was reading and felt that, besides, someone who talks for two hours on a crowded bus when specifically asked not to rather invites eavesdroppers.

I’m a certain age myself, and it’s possible that my hearing isn’t the sharpest, so I can only surmise that if I heard the whole thing, many of my fellow riders did, too. I missed words here and there as the bus rumbled over uneven pavement, but I got the gist of the conversation.

“How could you do this to me?” she stage-whispered. “You know how I feel. How could you do this to me?”

I couldn’t believe my ears. Someone was learning about a lover’s infidelity on a phone call on the Jitney. It sounded like her husband had just told her — by phone — that he was in love with someone else.

I attempted to focus my attention elsewhere. I picked my Kindle back up. The drama continued to unfold.

“How long did it go on?” I heard her ask. “Three years? No, I can’t keep it to myself. My sister will take one look at me and know something’s the matter. No. Don’t come to Amagansett.”

Hmm. Maybe it was a cheating boyfriend on the other end of the line, not a husband. I couldn’t help myself; I wanted to know more. I actually pondered getting up to go to the lavatory (as it is referred to on the Jitney) to get a look at the speaker, but I didn’t. I think a few others on the bus might have.

After quite a long time, it sounded as if she was crying. Oh, dear.

The whispering stopped. She had hung up. Everything was quiet for a while.

Then she dialed someone else. “I just have to tell somebody,” I heard her say.

The whole episode would make a good cartoon in The New Yorker, I think. I can visualize it now: A busful of Hamptonites snug in their Jitney seats, snacking on free pretzels, slyly rolling their eyes and bending their ears toward a damsel in distress, as she tearfully exclaims into an iPhone: “I just had to tell someone!”

 This anecdote doesn’t having a moral, unfortunately, and I admit it doesn’t make me look terribly good. But it does inspire a couple of tidbits of Hamptons advice. The first is: “Everyone can hear you on the Jitney. That’s why they have the three-minute rule in the first place.” The second is: “If you’re looking for a reality-television concept, consider the bus.”