By quarter to six on a Thursday in June, the lawn at Muskrat Park has already been claimed. Folding chairs in the second row. A cooler wedged under the gazebo bench. Two labs on leashes waiting out the last of the heat. The band is still tuning, and half the crowd is holding takeout boxes from somewhere on Talbot Street.
If you have lived in town for more than a season, none of this surprises you. What might: the reason Thursday looks like this is not accident or tradition. It is a coordinated schedule, and once you see the pieces line up, the rest of the summer week reorganizes itself around them.
Friday and Saturday belong to the visitors. Thursday belongs to the people who live here.
The 6 p.m. anchor
The gravitational center is the St. Michaels Community Center's free waterfront concert series.
