South Sudan. Dinka. Nuer.Cannibalism. Zanzibar. Boko Haram. Obama. Cameroon. IS. Caucasus. Iran. Syria. Russia. US. Turkey. Putin.
Outside the day is grey, gloomy, down right dark and definitely chill. My own spirits are quite the opposite. Despite the exterior my interior is quite bright, for no particular reason but I am delighted and grateful for the quiet joy of this dark day. I’m at my friend Todd’s office, doing some work for him and some for myself.
I had a couple of personal errands to do this morning and then I arrived here, an island of warmth and cheer on a dark and rainy day.
Reading about the conflict in South Sudan trumped my cheeriness. There has been violence ranging there for months and the two sides have been brutal. There are tales of the Dinka killing Nuer ruthlessly; sometimes making them jump into bonfires and then forcing people to eat the burnt flesh. There have been rapes, pillaging, burning of churches, all the things that happen when men get fire in their killing bellies.
Further south elections in Zanzibar may explode into violence and across the continent Nigeria has freed approximately 300 women from the Boko Haram.
Obama has sent three hundred soldiers to Cameroon to train soldiers. Africa and the Middle East are riven with Islamic terrorists. Some, like Boko Haram, have sworn allegiance to IS. And everywhere I look it seems we have a muddied response to it.
Iran has now joined the Syrian conversation at the same table with the US, Syria, Turkey and Saudi Arabia, its longtime regional rival. Iranian troops are on the ground in Syria. The Russians are there. The Turks seem to be chasing the Kurds there more than IS. It is a political, ideological swamp and in that swamp millions are displaced and dying.
Putin, who is playing around in Syria, has his own IS problem. There is a ragtag group of rebels in Russia who have declared the Caucasus Emirate and sworn allegiance to IS. Muslim Russians are being recruited by IS, going to fight and are returning. Mostly they are locked up or under police surveillance but the social unrest and economic hardships in that part of Putin’s Empire is making it easier for IS to recruit.
It is a cycle that may be coming around to bite Putin in the back. It’s why he says he is in Syria. Now some of the 7,000 Russians and former citizens of the Soviet Union who are there are trying to slip back into Russia to wreck havoc in retaliation.
Thinking I would get some relief by seeing what was happening in the world of entertainment, I quickly backed off when I kept finding stories about the ubiquitous Kardashians.
Goodness, looking at the world’s stories has tempered the day’s good natured-ness. I will have to get it back.
Letter from the Vineyard 
Letter From New York 06 04 2016 Thoughts on Main Street in Edgartown…
June 4, 2016The sun is laughing down Main Street in Edgartown, with cars slowly moving down the street, toward the water but without the congestion that is coming toward the end of the month when “the season” really gets going. Across the street, Sundog, selling clothes, is as empty as we are.
A few people have wandered into the store and have wandered out, rarely with a book in hand. A lovely mother and daughter came in, the mother buying her daughter a copy of “A Man Named Ove,” by Fredrik Backman, a book she insisted her daughter read before they left the island next week.
It’s been interesting, watching people come and go, looking at books, some are wildly enthusiastic, some are just looking as they look languidly at titles, hoping something will spark their interest.
As I said to someone yesterday, I have a whole new respect for those who work in retail.
The morning was foggy, the afternoon sun blessed. Music from the 1960’s plays gently in the background, the soundtrack of my youth. It is easy here to put away the woes of the world and believe in the loveliness of life.
Unfortunately, the reality is quite different in the off island world.
Muhammed Ali is being mourned everywhere. A figure in my youth, I watched with fascination, not quite understanding his moves but also not being bothered by them. If he no longer wanted to Cassius Clay, then why not? There were days then I didn’t want to be Mathew Tombers.
Many of his moves outraged the world and shook people up. All for the ultimate good… Rest in peace, Muhammed Ali, rest in peace and may flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.
Bernie Sanders has announced he will contest the Democratic Convention, fighting down to the last moment.
In France, floods are beginning to recede but not until after claiming three more lives. My friends, Chuck and Lois, who have an apartment in Paris, are somewhere else with friends, waiting to get back to their place when the waters do recede. Guards are standing watch at Louvre and artwork has been moved to higher ground as a precaution. It has been nearly 34 years since this kind of flooding has been seen in the City of Lights.
It has been determined that Prince died from an accidental, self-administered dose of fentanyl, a pain killer 100 times more powerful than morphine and 50 times more powerful than heroin. One doctor described self-administration of fentanyl as playing with death; it is not to be used outside of hospitals.
The opiate crisis is enormous. Even here on bucolic Martha’s Vineyard, meetings are being held to combat the island’s heroin problem. Everywhere you turn right now, opiates are a critical problem. It may be that Prince’s death will be a catalyst for change.
It is the 27th Anniversary of the massacre in Tiananmen Square and tens of thousands have gathered in Hong Kong to commemorate the event, shunning the official memorial because it has become too “Chinese” oriented.
In the Mediterranean, with the beginning of warm weather, more migrants/refugees are risking the sea to reach Europe and what they hope will be a better life. It is believed a thousand have drowned in the past week alone. It will only grow worse.
Many are fleeing IS, which now finds itself fighting on four fronts in Syria and Iraq. The unofficial capital of IS is Raqqa and Syrian forces, under the cover of Russian airstrikes and with help from Hezbollah have reached the border of Raqqa province.
Attempting to follow who is fighting whom in that part of the world is not easy. IS is struggling for control of a town called Marea, which is controlled by the anti-Assad Nursa Front, which is associated with Al Qaeda. There is also heavy fighting around Aleppo, once Syria’s largest city and commercial center.
The sun is beginning to set in Edgartown. The streets are still quiet. Anita, who works in the shop, has gone home as we are completely quiet. Last night, after everyone had left and I was closing down, I had the most remarkable moment of peace, surrounded by books with the walls resonating with the laughter and voices of the people who had passed through yesterday, just looking for a good read.
Tags:A Man Called Ove, Al Qaeda, Aleppo, Bernie Sanders, Chuck and Lois Bachrach, Donald Trump, Edgartown, Fentanyl, Fredrik Backman, IS, Louvre, Martha's Vineyard, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Muhammed Ali, opiates, Paris Flooding, Prince, Tiananmen Square
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