A Most Mysterious Vineyard T-Shirt

I got to thinking about my MV T-shirts, of which I have a few. OK, more then a few.

Some are from events that I went to: Illumination Night in Oak Bluffs, which takes place this year on Wed, Aug. 17; the Harry Connick Jr/Carly Simon concert at the Tabernacle on Sept. 16, 1990; and also at the Tabernacle, the Boston Pops on Aug 4, 2001.

Some are of places on Martha's Vineyard: The Flying Horses in Oak Bluffs, Espresso Love in Edgartown, Midnight Farm store in Vineyard Haven, the old Tivoli building in Oak Bluffs.

The Black Dog is one of the most famous T-shirts. I do, however, have a red one from 1987, which is before the well-known image of the black dog appeared.

And then there's the shirt.

Unlike the others, this T-shirt has a story. Oh, OK, some of the others have storie, too—but not quite like this one!

Walking down the street in Edgartown about 10 or so years ago, I spotted this particular T-shirt in the window of a store. I liked the cartoon depictions of MV landmarks, and also the cute characters enjoying themselves. It seemed like a perfect shirt. I wanted it badly, but alas it was around 8 p.m. on an early May evening and the store was closed up tight. I obsessed on this shirt all evening. I could see it in my mind's eye: the Flying Horses, the cliffs at Gay Head, Martha’s Vineyard spelled out in semaphore flags, the airport, the lighthouses, the ferries, the gingerbread houses– just about everything was there.

The next morning we got to the store as it was opening. But wait, the T-shirt was not in the window. Where was it? We dashed inside and I explained to the ladies there that I had seen a certain T-shirt in the window less then 12 hours before and now it wasn’t there. They looked perplexed! Neither of them knew what T-shirt I was talking about; they’d never seen a T-shirt like that before and would certainly have remembered such a different sort of one. I wondered if I’d entered the Twilight Zone.

They reiterated that it couldn’t have possibly have been in their window. They closed the store up the night before and had been the only ones working in the store all day. I know my dreams are vivid, but I didn’t think I was that good.

Oh, well. As long as we were there we decided to browse. With a sigh I headed off to half-heartily look around. Cute stuff, but . . .  hold on a second. Something caught my eye. It wasn’t even with the other T-shirts; it was mingled in with, I don’t remember what, all I knew was that I had found it! I grabbed my prize and ran to show it to the ladies. They were stunned; they had never seen that t-shirt before!

So, I ask you, was it in the window the night before? Sid someone move it out of the window and onto a rack without their knowledge? Is this story made up? Does the T-shirt even exist for certain?