Pure luck

I listened to the commentary before, during and after Irene, the vast majority of it uninformed, nothing more than the nervous tittering of the masses in the face of something they don't understand, displaying in starkest terms the terribly slow evolutionary progression from cave-dweller to contemporary human being. Some of the blather was unaccountably cruel -- one so-called pundit opined, "At least this'll be good for the economy, what with all the rebuilding that needs to be done." Another mean-spirited clown somehow married the words "Irene" and "God's judgement" together in a feeble attempt at humor. I live among a coarse and superstitious people, unbearably noisy at times, trying their darnedest -- like me -- to figure out how best to retain their humanity and some species of decency in an indecent age. They can't buy it. They can't eat their way to it, or fuck their way to it, or speed their way to it, or fight their way to it, or, worst of all, pray their way to it. And they can't count on the experts because the experts are full of shit.

We've had fifty years of TV schooling and it's caught up with us. Everything is reality TV until a natural calamity comes along and destroys a life, or a livelihood, or a neighborhood, or a home, and the tittering begins. How can one not feel pity and terror at the plight of being human in a half-lit world?

Here is my backyard this past Monday morning:

And here is my backyard Monday afternoon:

I was a lucky bastard, again. I've been lucky most of my life, riding the wheel of fortune into a state of irrational calm, pronouncing the whole trip a wonderment so far. Some day my luck will run out. It's as simple as that.