HERE'S THE ONLY ANALYSIS I NEED

The Romney/Ryan ticket lost in every state either of them has ever lived in. Obama/Biden ticket won in the states where they have lived. Obviously the people who have known them the best in the case of Romney/Ryan voted for the other guys and in the case of Obama/Biden voted for their own guys.

QUOTES FROM THE CAMPAIGN ONE LAST TIME

SANDY REVERB

Started out the day driving to a nearby town for some physical rehab I'm in the middle of that got interrupted by Sandy, only to find the place without power and so closed, despite a call the night before that the power was back on there.

The route I took was convoluted because there are still so many trees and wires down. Saw trees smashed into houses and wires pulled down across streets still blocked off a week after the storm. Not as bad as too many places but still. Then drove to Whole Foods through an intersection with three gas stations on three of its corners and all closed. The traffic light had been out yesterday bit it was working now, though the stations weren't.

Nor was the shopping center where The Whole Foods is, though it was open, literally, its front doors wide open to allow the cold air in because they were operating on a generator with dimmed lights and no recorded music backdrop, and the outside air helped keep the food fresh and the freezers probably running with less energy expended. It almost felt magical, especially since it was even better stocked than usual and the last time I'd been there the day before the storm there was no bread, no water, no a lot of stuff. Not today, overflowing with produce and frozen goods and baked goods and meat and the little containers of chocolate milk my teenager thrives on.

Then I drive back home to find my power out! For a week, give or take a half hour, I was one of the only ones among my family and friends who had power and now that many of them, but unfortunately not all, had regained power, I lose it! And the entire little village center area where I live, the restaurants and all, and it was full of kids getting out of school in their Halloween costumes because they couldn't celebrate it on the 31st so the governor moved it to the 5th. As it grew darker the kids loved it because the restaurants and shops were still giving out candy but with no light so the darker it got the more scary it got too.

It relieved some of the survivor's guilt to be sitting in the dark and absolute silence after the sun went down. Mt teen's mother brought over a few candles since the one I thought I had was used to "wax" curbs and other skateboarding spots it turned out. Just when I was settling into the idea of an early bedtime under a stack of covers as it was growing cold with no light and no heat, it came back on.

So, only a half a day or so without heat or electricity, but enough to get a very tiny taste of what so many have been going through and feel even more compassion for them. Sandy was an enormous weather event that will be making people miserable for quite a long time. Just think of Kristina, only in the freezing cold and over an area several times as big.

Here's just one little incident to describe the outermost ripples from Sandy's impact. A friend came by this evening to watch some news on my TV because even though he had power through the entire experience, he doesn't have any cable or Internet connection (and his mother who lives across the street from him had no power at all so was staying with him and his wife) so he hadn't seen the regular news in a week. Something we all take for granted. A very slight inconvenience you might say compared to what others are suffering. And that's true, but still emblematic of the still reverberating effects of this storm in even small ways.

STILL RECOVERING

Spent a good weekend in The Berkshires where the damage from Sandy was minimal, mostly just a few power outages. Saw my oldest son play with the band he's in, BELL ENGINE, and the level of musicianship was as impressive as ever. Saw his son perform in a play at school put on by mostly 8th graders and he was singularly impressive, staying in character no matter what and getting some of the best laughs and never not being heard in the back of the house.

Driving back today it was like returning to almost a different world. The number of downed trees increased, the lines at gas stations grew, and then the obvious lack of electricity became apparent. By the time we pulled off the highway in Union heading into Vauxhall, the traffic lights were out, temporary stop signs had been set up, trees were still in some roads. Back in our town, a lot of folks who didn't have power now do, but a lot still don't. My youngest son's high school is open tomorrow for the first time in over a week, but several elementary schools aren't because either they don't have power or the nearby streets still have downed wires and trees blocking them.

It was heartening to see all the out-of-state utility trucks, or whatever you call the electric company trucks that have those little bucket extensions. As it's heartening to see so many people able to get warm and be dry. But still distressful to see so many still without power and many even without homes. The death toll continues to rise and more devastation continues to be revealed.

And now another storm is headed our way. Not as big, not as strong, not as bad, but still with gusts expected to get as high as sixty miles an hour. That can only mean more trees down and taking wires with them. Fingers crossed, hoping it misses all of us.

TOO GLIB?

Dig the moment, whatever it is, and be grateful? Isn't that a little glib, Michael? What if in that moment you're freezing and unable to use the toilet or take a shower because you've lost power from a monster storm for almost a week now? Or suffering from the consequences of a wildfire, or earthquake, or tornado, or flood or mudslide or tsunami...?

Or what if you lost a home or worse a loved one or, God forbid, a child? How the hell do you dig that moment and be grateful, you schmuck?!

I woke up in the middle of the night thinking these questions in response to the post I wrote before falling asleep last night. I haven't suffered through most of the things I mention in those questions so who am I to be so glib with my hipster New Age philosophy?

There is no way a person who has suffered great personal loss can't help feeling angry and hurt and even vengeful and victimized among other negative feelings.  At least that's the way I've felt. My old friend Hubert Selby Jr. ("Cubby" to his friends) used to say life is just a series of decisions and we make those decisions either based on fear or love. When I'd argue with him that there's more than just that, like what about hate and anger and etc. he'd say those are just forms that fear takes.

Over a period of years as I aged and Cubby and I spent more and more time together, I came to accept what I had originally taken for an oversimplification, because my experience proved it to be true. And this perspective helped me through some pretty rough spots. Not that I didn't initially react to many of them with anger, my usual reflex when hurt, but the more years that went by (and the more stuff that hurt seemed to accumulate) the more useful his perspective became to me.

So that when spouses and partners and friends and family left me either by choice or by circumstance or I suffered other personal losses (of the five siblings who made it to adulthood I only have one left, for instance, and my parents have been gone for many decades, and some vital parts of me have been removed as well in recent years) I was able to either immediately, or eventually, accept that these losses weren't being done to me, they were just happening as they always do, and will, to one extent or another.

I am hugely grateful that I have had power throughout this last week, and that I have a car that I could get far enough in to be able to get gas and without too long a wait, and that I was able to stay warm and use the facilities, as they used to say, without problems. And my heart goes out to those who have to deal with the hardships caused by Sandy, especially those who've lost their homes and even their loved ones.

I can't say what I would do in those circumstances. My guess is I'd be deeply depressed and angry and even vengeful, toward what I don't know but I'd find something: politicians, God, neighbors, myself most likely for making bad choices, etc. But I know from recent years' experience that I would be able to return to some kind of equanimity before too long by reminding myself that I have no control over weather, nature, other people for the most part, the past, etc. and would give up the notion that this is somehow personal, like the universe is picking specifically on ME, and that randomness and impermanence is the natural state of the universe, at least most of it as I have experienced it.

And I also know from experience that the path to happiness is gratitude. If I can be grateful, even force myself to be, I will feel better. I have many times said "Thank you God" or "Thank you universe" with a sneer and as sarcastic a tone as I can create while throwing both middle fingers in the air, and despite that attitude felt just a tiny bit better having voiced even sarcastic bitter phony gratitude. It's some kind of antidote to despair and the fear that despair comes from, as well as to anger and vengeance and hatred and scorn and all the other things that I thought sustained me in my youth when I was hurt by someone or something.

Anyway, sorry to go on, and I know, or assume maybe, that there is no consolation for some losses for some people. And I have been exceptionally lucky in this latest natural catastrophe so I shouldn't be talking about this maybe, but nonetheless, in my own crises I have experienced at times amazing serenity by simply accepting reality, that is, digging the moment whatever it is and being grateful, no matter what. Even if it took me many moments to get to that.

And obviously for a lot of people that is their response as well, which is why many without power have expressed gratitude that they still have homes and their loved ones, and many who lost homes express gratitude for still having their lives and loved ones. Though for those who have lost loved ones it is the most difficult, I imagine, to feel any kind of gratitude.

Yet there is the cliched, but still real, consolation that those who are gone no longer have to deal with pain and disappointment and all the seemingly negative consequences of being alive, so that our pain over their loss is really for ourselves for not having them anymore in our lives, especially children, whose futures we imagine would have been bright and here for us to share and enjoy and be happy and grateful for. Though we know from reality that may not have been the case.

I knew Chris Reeves a little, met him a few times, had dinner with him once, all before his accident. I'm sure he had his bad moments, even days or weeks, but from everything I heard and saw he had an amazingly positive attitude. You could say it may have been easier for him with such a devoted wife and the resources for the best care etc. And that's true, but I suspect we all know folks whose circumstances are a lot less comfortable and yet have survived excruciating circumstances with grace and little or no bitterness because they have found some kind of acceptance of their reality and something to be grateful for despite their circumstances.

I guess what this is all about is my own desire to be of service to those in need and in dire conditions or suffering terrible losses, to try and bring some relief emotionally at least, no matter how small or fleeting. I know for many of us who have faced death the most direct and immediate consequence emotionally was to realize that in the end the only thing that matters is love, and the only thing that gets in the way of that is fear, in any of the forms it takes.

[PS: Which in no way implies that sadness isn't the natural response to loss of any kind, particularly loved ones. Anyone who's read Selby's novels knows that sadness was at the core of his aesthetic for most of his life and fear the basis for most of his characters' actions. It was almost ironic that he brought the light of compassion and all kinds of love into the lives of so many of his friends and acquaintances and taught us how to cope through his simple summations of his philosophy and yet wrote such dark novels. Which is why we were so close I think. Sadness was the emotion I most often short circuited with anger. I still have that tendency, as anyone who knows me knows, but the gift Cubby gave me is the ability to see that anger for what it is and address it by summoning up whatever kind of gratitude I can muster, even the fake kind, because, as I said above, even when sarcastic and angry and phony expressing gratitude still works even if only a little. And for those of us who have suffered, as all humans do from time to time if not continually, even just a few seconds of relief is something to be grateful for. And once you start that gratitude train moving, it becomes harder and harder to derail. Okay Michael, enough already.]

IMPERMANENCE

The death toll continues to rise from the wrath of Sandy. Photos and film of the disaster continue to be introduced showing the devastation was, and is, even greater than everything that's come before showed. Just walking around my neighborhood, including the beautiful park I've posted about many times, was a revelation. Giant trees torn out by the roots and pulling down phone and utility lines with them.

The tree guys have done the best job so far, getting at least the parts of trees blocking traffic cut and removed, or moved, so that cars can get by, opening up more and more streets, though some remain closed. The low hanging wire on my street was raised, and traffic is flowing there again. But most of my family and friends and neighbors without power are still without it, and many of them have gone to relatives and friends who have it, either around my area or further away, like some friends who went to their parents in the Bronx, others to Pittsburgh, and me to Western Massachusetts.

My teenager's mom, and some of her friends who don't have power too, are staying at my apartment while our son and I drove up to The Berkshires for the weekend to stay with my oldest friend [that's one of my post-brain-op strange brain tricks, my brain told my fingers to type "oldest son" but my fingers typed "oldest friend"] and grandson. It was a revealing ride.

We didn't just pass nearby areas, like Union, with damage—on one street there were three telephone and utility poles in a row knocked onto the ground or into houses with the wires still attached—but going further on the Garden State Parkway we passed a three mile long line for gas. When we got on the road I had only two gallons of gas left, but I knew my Prius—you knew I'd own a Prius, an old one, in fact one of the early ones—would get us at least well up into New York state and it did.  Each gas station as we got further North had shorter lines until we finally stopped in Brewster where the lines were only ten or twenty cars long.

We did pass stations that weren't working, either out of gas or of power. And saw many knocked down trees and some obviously outage areas. But for the most part it only got better the closer we got to Massachusetts. When we first got on the parkway we passed a long caravan of power trucks coming from Florida, which was heartening. And later coming in the other direction trucks from New Hampshire and some that looked like they might be from Canada!

Western Mass got off pretty easy, not much more than some power outages, but Eastern Mass, especially on the coast, got hit pretty badly. As did Rhode Island and Connecticut. They weren't mentioned much on the TV show tonight to raise money for the Red Cross's efforts. It was only an hour long and totally low budget. The set looked like one room with no decoration just some microphones and appearances by mostly homeboys and girls like Christine Aguilera, Mary K. Blige, Bruce Springtseen, Billy Joel, Stephen Tyler, Jon Bon Jovi, etc. Their performances were pretty raw, not always perfectly miked (can't spell that "miced," it looks like the rodent) but pretty powerful and in some cases unique, like Jimmy Fallon singing lead on "Under The Boardwalk" with Tyler, Springsteen and Joel doing backups! Or Sting playing acoustic guitar and singing "Message in a Bottle."

The most powerful was Billy Joel doing a song I can't remember the name of ("I Saw the Lights go out on Broadway"?) but for which he changed the lyrics to match Sandy's wrath and aftermath. It was pure brilliance. Brian Williams and Jon Stewart and Whoopi Goldberg and Tina Fey were among the introducers of the musical acts and pleaders for donations to The Red Cross relief effort for victims of Sandy. (You can probably find it online).

And all I could think of throughout the day and the onslaught of information and images of the disaster and its continuing toll was how impermanent everything is, even coastlines, even great cities, even all of us. And how important it is to dig the moment for whatever it is and be grateful. Easy advice and perspective from someone who still has power and a home and didn't lose any family or friends in this one. But I have in others, so I know a little of what that might feel like. And I still say: dig the moment for whatever it is and be grateful.

SANDY'S WAKE (& CELTIC NEW YEAR)

Sandy is still wreaking havoc in its wake. First of all the death toll keeps rising. In some places nearby and not so nearby there are people still trapped by flood waters. Hoboken is the primary nearby example. People in the first floors of apartment buildings were told to evacuate but those on the higher floors not. The authorities assumed any flood waters would rapidly recede.

But they haven't, so there are folks trapped on higher floors with no power, running out of food, etc. and chest high water full of sewage and oil and gas etc. to wade through if they try to get out. They're talking a week to ten days before the power's all back on even in my little community. Traffic lights still out, gas lines at the few gas stations that can still pump it (the pumps are all electronically controlled). Etc.

But as in all natural disasters (like the earthquakes and California wildfires and other events I've lived through) the damage is always random. For instance yesterday my teenager's mother who has no power suddenly lost it in her car as well just as she was trying to get back to her small business which involves a lot of driving. It was like some cosmic joke, but turned out to just be a bad battery. The only problem was the auto shops and stores are mostly shut down.

But it turned out, thanks to a neighbor and friend we learned that Irvington, which is only a few blocks from the old house (actually a historic preservation site) her apartment is in had power.  It was so surreal to drive down the main drag that leads through Irvington into Newark (where the power is mostly off and people are also still trapped in their apartments in many instances) and see all the stores open and traffic lights working and people out and about like it was a normal day.

Irvington is a mostly African-American town and mostly working people and poor people, so there seemed to be some poetic justice in that. The auto store was jumping and a nice young man gave us  a lot of help, and there was also a freelance mechanic working the busy parking lot willing to put in a new alternator if that's what was needed.

It ended up taking a few hours and that neighbor driving down with a Black and Decker battery charger that also could test the alternator and a few exchanges of batteries (I bought a new one then they decided it was the alternator but the machine that tests them was broken so I got a refund on the new battery than my friend arrived and said the alternator was ok so back to the new battery etc.) but in the end her car is running and everyone was more than helpful and patient.

Got back to my apartment and a ton of teenagers with nowhere to go and not much to do (most of them from homes without power, and school canceled for the entire week due to downed wires and no power etc.). I had let some members of a poetry workshop I run in my living room Wednesday evenings know I had power if they wanted to come and discuss poetry, or just get warm and recharge if their power was out, and two members showed up from a nearby town where one had power and the other didn't. The latter was grateful to be in a warm place.

We talked poetry and other things while teenagers came in and out and my teen's mother too, who decided to skip the fierce cold at her powerless place and stay at my place. When they left another teen's father came over to charge his phone and laptop and watch the news and eventually our teenage sons and their friend (the others teen finally having left close to midnight) decided to watch the STAR WARS where Darth Vader becomes Darth Vader and were overwhelmed with nostalgia as they remembered their long ago youth (they're all around fifteen) and concluded that it was still actually a pretty cool movie after starting out hooting and laughing and making fun of their boyhood folly in digging it back then.

This event is far from over as anyone watching the news must know. The immediate effects will be felt by many for weeks, and for years for some. But the overall reaction I can only have is enormous gratitude that my family here is safe and sound and that my older children and their loved ones up in Massachusetts are safe and sound too. And I pray the same is true for you.

[Oh, and PS: Happy Celtic New Year (and for TPW happy birthday), and in honor of that here's a photo I took of my late Irish cousin Paddy in front of the ancestral home—where my Irish grandfather grew up though back then it was even smaller) taken not long after it was vacated after centuries of use so the thatch is already beginning to rot from the lack of a fire within and would soon decay and disappear leaving only crumbled walls today.]