Patriotism, Vineyard history and the meaning of the Fourth of July holiday remain vibrant at Memorial Park in Edgartown. The one-and-one-half acre park has never looked finer. The Civil War-era cannons and cannonballs, the whaling-era trypot and other aging features of the park were just recently repainted.

Tomorrow is the 108th birthday of the dedication of the park and the unveiling of a tall bronze obelisk, a tribute to the service of veterans, men and women, who served in the Civil War, a war that was felt deeply by the residents of the Vineyard.

No doubt about it, David Kinney gets the Vineyard. His book, The Big One, shows that. But he could not live here, he reckons, without succumbing to the obsession which the book chronicles.

Fishing, that is.

As we bumped along a sandy track through Chappaquiddick on Sunday night, he with one hand on the steering wheel, and the other holding the tips of his surf rods to stop them rattling on the windshield, he imagined his life if he lived here all the time.

Tom DeMont, 68, has a quiet time in the morning when he sits and makes scrimshaw. It is a serene opening to the day. For 32 years, Mr. DeMont has sat in the quiet of the day to sketch scenes of the whaling era on a material similar to whale teeth. He is an Island-born artist, a craftsman, a folksinger, lyricist and gallery owner.

Mr. DeMont runs Edgartown Scrimshaw Gallery, a fine arts store filled with items made in a lifetime of creative pursuits.

Island recreational anglers can now land fluke without breaking the law. The recreational season for fluke opened on Wednesday and the word along the shore is encouraging. Commercial fishermen have been dragging for fluke for weeks with positive results.

This is the first summer recreational fishermen were restricted from catching fluke at the start of the fishing season. They are pretty salty about it, but commercial fishermen have been dealing with openings and closings for decades.

A beautiful, small painting of the Gay Head Cliffs has returned to the Vineyard for a short visit, possibly the first time since it was painted 125 years ago. The painting by John Noble Barlow depicts colorful cliffs and a turbulent dark sea. The waves are translucent in the late afternoon sun. It is an impressive oil painting that presents an opportunity for an amazing tale.

Contained in a wide gold-leaf frame, the painting was hung at the West Tisbury Free Public Library on Tuesday and it will remain there in the main room through the month of July.

A classic northeaster early this week on top of an unusually wet and gray June left Islanders wondering if they would ever see the sun again. From Monday through Wednesday an offshore ocean storm spun 200 miles southeast of Nantucket, bringing sustained wind, ruining outdoor events and keeping sailors on dry land.

Meteorologists at the National Weather Service office in Taunton said the storm was an anomaly, not big enough to be a gale, but strong enough to pound away for three straight days.