From time to time, whenever inspiration aligns with respiration, I will be contributing a column to this paper. It will cover some aspect of moving to and living on this Island, trekking toward retirement while reducing stress and making mole hills out of former mountains. Welcome to the Washashore Chronicles.

Last April, we waved goodbye to the mainland and moved permanently to the Vineyard. At first it felt as if we had tread a tightrope without the benefit of a net. Are we serious? Can we sever ties to the Greater Boston area where we had been living for most of our 60-plus years and leap across the water? Can we adjust to a life that uses boats and planes the size of those boats? Can we live in a place that has time periods called in-season and off-season? Will we find our way inside a year-round community?

So far, the answer has been a resounding yes. Then again, we have been blessed by the angel of good timing. We have managed to endure our first winter that wasn’t. And part of the reason we’re here is because last winter definitely WAS!

As autumn approached in 2010, just before the first snow flakes gathered momentum, we went off to our Island house — a cottage in Menemsha — to contemplate our future. Bought it in 1987. Served us well. Gave us many splendid moments, especially in summer. Budgeting for the rest of our lives, we decided to sell the place (the mortgage is paid off) and keep our large home in Natick.

Then, a good friend had a birthday celebration at her home in Vineyard Haven under the stars of a September sky as well as under a heated tent. The evening sealed a different deal. The friends, the conversation, the communal spirit, the smell of the air, the exultation that stirred the sea-bound quiet. The awakening: most of these good people actually live here. They are our friends. How could we ever leave? We opted to keep Menemsha, sell Natick and scale down to an apartment in Boston.

Then plans got buried in 81 inches of snow. As 2010 stormed into 2011, it seemed as if we woke up to another 10 inches of impediment every three days. The plowing service had a tough time keeping up. What was a backyard soon resembled a small-scale diorama of the Himalayas. Our poor yellow Lab, Floyd, would go out to do his business and flash a look that said, “You must be kidding?” So I would shovel out bathrooms for him, but that got harder since every night so did the snow.

This, of course, led to ice dams. As fast as we could get the snow off the roof, it would pile up again and ooze right up into the rafters. Soon our living room took on the characteristics of a rain forest. Some trickling here, some buckling there. Then one night, while we prepared for bed, there was a loud rumbling crash, as if a bus had plowed into the house. Downstairs in our living room our ceiling had caved in, dropping about 150 pounds of drywall onto the furniture and carpet.

Floyd was so pooped from mountaineering, he slept right through the disaster and the clean-up. We informed our would-be buyers we’d have the whole thing fixed before the closing. We kept our word.

We called our Vineyard friends to commiserate. Some said: “What’s an ice dam?” Others chimed in: “A lot of snow? Where?” Could this be true? You mean by going to the Vineyard, you actually were “going south” in more ways than one? That was enough for us. We gave up the idea of finding an apartment in Boston, but.

We couldn’t live year-round in the Menemsha house. We’d go out of our minds. In fact, it was so small we would have to go outside to go out of our minds. Inside, there wasn’t even room for both of us to be beside ourselves with anger. Then there was the Floyd factor. Nearly 100 pounds, he transformed inside our Menemsha house from dog into motivated ottoman. Every place I sat down he sat down. One time, I got up and he didn’t, I tripped over him and wound up tasting carpet fiber. Not a pleasant way to live, not for 12 months straight.

Then there was the issue of remoteness. In the off-season, from our kitchen window in Menemsha, we could see Russia. At least that’s what it looked like. Tranquil yet desolate. We’d have to travel a half hour for a tube of toothpaste, a box of detergent or some sign of civilization. Granted we had our share of neighbors we loved but, if our year-round future was to be on this Island, we decided we’d feel better driving — not walking — to see them from a slightly less isolated spot.

If we sell both Natick and Menemsha, however, we could explore a more intriguing realty bracket. We found our home in Vineyard Haven, walking distance to everything, including those boats that take you off the island. More about that in a later article.

The specialness of the Vineyard — the small-town life, the community-mindedness, the inner warmth, the outer beauty, plus the native and educated intelligence that lifts it several cuts above Lake Wobegon­—makes the Island a thinking man’s Mayberry.

What a place to call home.

Arnie Reisman and his wife, Paula Lyons, regularly appear on the weekly NPR comedy quiz show, Says You! He also writes for the Huffington Post.