Why We're Doomed (Unless We Learn to Find our Inner Teenager)

Some have accused me of being pessimistic when it comes to evaluating humankind's potential to fix its historically persistent problems. They're right. I am.

This morning, I heard a news report from one of Mitt Romney's speaking engagements. A (Republican) woman being interviewed criticized Governor Chris Christie (a Republican) of New Jersey of being "too effusive" in his praise of President Obama's help with the storm crisis in New Jersey. She feared it would go against Mitt Romney's chances of being elected.

Am I going insane, or is this as absurd as it sounds?

Hold on, my fine Democrat readers. Before you clap me on the back for exposing Republican stupidity (a stupidity that does apply to a lot of Republicans, for sure, just as it applies to people in general) let's consider this little meme posted by a friend of mine on Facebook -- from a site that proclaims itself to be "Sick of the Slant" -- because there is no slant in the chosen pictures, of course (you can click to enlarge the picture):

Hurricane-force Lessons

Yesterday, before twilight, I went out onto the back deck (which I'd completely cleared) and stood watching the trees in the woods behind my house bending almost sideways in the wind gusts. I have heard writers talk about what it means to truly experience the awesome force of nature and how it feels to be riveted to a spot despite (or maybe because of) the danger. Well, there it was.

The wind had a volcano-deep rumble I had never experienced and I could actually smell sea-salt in the air -- presumably spun up and trapped in the vortex of the massive storm as it had gathered force over the Atlantic, ever since Cuba -- even though my house is some sixty miles from the coast.

Camuccini: "Fallen Tree Trunk"

I turned from the woods to the massive split-trunked oak on the garage side of my house. I stood perched to jump back into the house as the wind gusted again. But the old man stood more firm than any of his cousins in the woods. There wasn't the slightest flex in his trunks and his upper branches only waved as if they were enjoying gentle spring winds. This is a tree we were warned to have removed. "It will come down," a tree guy told us. "Just a matter of when."

But time passes and you don't bank on hurricanes.

Hurricane Sandy

Cot: "The Storm"

It will be a quick one today. As I write, 8:30 am, Monday, October 29, 2012, the state of New Jersey is about to be directly hit with "the second biggest hurricane in recorded history." Our house right in its projected path, though not on the coast, where the most devastating damage is already being done. They say the shoreline will be permanently altered by this one. When a storm is being called worse than Grace -- The Perfect Storm -- it's nothing to sneeze at.

So, we're in a historic moment, here. There are some who are really aware of that and who are intrigued, as I am, and there are others who don't care. There are those who are petrified. There are those who are not the least bit fazed. There are those who are courageously defiant in the face of danger.

Just so, as with most remarkable things, this storm sets up a microcosmic portrait of humankind: the fools, the paranoid ones; the heroes; the simply and rationally prepared -- they are all exposed by their reactions to Hurricane Sandy.