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Columnists

Gristmill: Return of the Moviegoer

Once more unto the darkened theater — for escape or togetherness?

Apr 21, 2021
The Shipwreck Rose: War of Words

Linguists and writers of a certain pompousness (ahem, me) like to debate the relative euphoniousness of words at dinner parties. Have you heard this thing about the most beautiful phrase in the English language being “cellar door”? What about "defenestration" or "lollygag," "twilight" or "jubilee"?

Apr 21, 2021
Gristmill: Dirtbags ‘R’ Us

Some thoughts on the coming gentrification of Sag Harbor’s mini strip mall, the Water Street Shops.

Apr 14, 2021
The Shipwreck Rose: Out of Fashion

My rubber-band ball, made entirely from rubber bands, grew bigger every day. It was bigger than a softball, bigger than a  grapefruit. It was heavy and perfectly round. I liked to bounce it, like Steve McQueen in “The Great Escape,” off the wall of my first office at Vogue magazine, when I got my start in 1998. Everyone loved Steve McQueen, the 1970s tough guy with cruel lips, in the summer of 1998.

Bam. Pause. Bam.

People often ask me about what life was like at Vogue, back in the Gilded Age before the Millennium, before 9/11, before the collapse of print media.

Apr 14, 2021
Point of View: A Eureka Moment

Recently, I was asked to retrieve from The Star’s attic contacts and negatives of Troy Bowe, the former Killer Bees’ point guard, in action. The request set my head to spinning like a leptoquark, for, as I told Carl Johnson, who had made the request, “It’s a black hole up there, a bottomless pit from which it has been said nothing escapes.”

Apr 14, 2021
The Mast-Head: ‘What Are You Doing Here?’

At the risk of offending my friends from Sag Harbor, what is up with those people? Most of the time that I run into someone I know in that village, the first thing they say is, “What are you doing over here?” with the emphasis on “you.”

“I wanted to go to Persan’s for a clam knife,” I protest. They tilt their head ever so slightly, suspicious

Apr 14, 2021
The Shipwreck Rose: Far Side of the Moon

I’m never happier than when the power goes out, and all the humming machines, low-buzzing appliances, furnaces, and neighborhood pool heaters shut down, and the house goes quiet. Partly I feel this relief because, like Greta Garbo, I just want to be left alone . . .

Apr 7, 2021
Point of View: Vernal Fervor

Soon, I’m told, we’ll be able to grow six marijuana plants (or is it 12 per couple filing jointly?), which, as I said to Mary, may impel me to get back to gardening again.

I once was avid in that regard, my steering wheel turning of its own accord when I’d be driving by Hren’s (now Groundworks). But the deer feasted on just about everything I grew, and if it wasn’t the deer, it was the voles.

Apr 7, 2021
The Mast-Head: Wrong Before

I can remember quite clearly the conversation with a friend who knew a thing or two about town politics. At least a dozen years ago, he and I got into it about if anyone really wanted to close the East Hampton Airport. I said no; he said I was wrong. Cut to, as they say, today, and it is clear that my friend was onto something.

Apr 7, 2021
Gristmill: Woe to the Warehouse

The dull warehouse has come in for reconsideration in light of Amazon’s exponential growth and the drive for unionization.

Apr 7, 2021
Gristmill: The Chuck and Kenny Show

The commentary of Charles Barkley and Kenny Smith — the last vestiges of a watchable N.B.A.

Mar 31, 2021
The Shipwreck Rose: Semper Fido

My mother, who wrote a column called “Connections” in this space for more than 40 years, has only made one remark on “The Shipwreck Rose” since I began my own column last July: “I see you are styling the dog’s name as one word, Sweetpea,” she says, with the sideways gaze and slightly arched eyebrows of a disdainful veteran copy editor, “rather than two.”

Mar 31, 2021