Looking Ahead

LOOKING AHEAD by Wally Dobeli Devastating hurricane brings good hopes for the Presidency On the afternoon of Monday, September, 29, Sandy the hurricane put out the electric lights in Lower Manhattan, from about 30th Street o, leaving the T&V country in total darkness, partly lifted on Thursday September 1. As of this writing Stuyvesant Town /PCV is only partly lit, and hot water and heat cannot be expected to be fully restore before Sunday Nov.11, if then. Sandy destroyed parts of each borough, and killed local population, particularly in Staten Island, where people were slow to move into shelters, and really crippled New Jersey. Tis is the worst storm since the 1938 New England hurricane (that was before the cute naming convention), far exceeding those of 1992, 2002, 2008 Hanna and even the 2011 Irene. I am writing these lines on Sunday, with a deadline on Tuesday, two days before the Presidential Election, and using the voting statistics, we can say that some seven states (VA, PA, WV, MD, NJ, NC, OH) have suffered electric system damages that will affect the election outcome. NY and FL have paper ballot alternatives, with optical scanners to automate the counting in their damaged districts. OCRs have been found to be unreliable and error prone in some instances, so we may look forward to a slow validation, unless the balloting results are really overwhelmingly one-sided. A call to ACLU in DC, to find whether the citizen groups plan an action to secure a delay brought in a request for my deadline info, so there may be some action forthcoming. At least one legal opinion, from Heritage Foundation, finds that the President cannot extend the time, but what about the Supreme Court? Stay tuned. Anyway, in preparation for the blackout, we bought extra Dcells for the portable radio, and AA batteries for four or five small flashlights, plus some food (the gas stove was expected to function, and it did), and gallon bottles of drinking water. filled the bathtub, remembering Mayor Koch’s favorite line for past water shortages, “if it’s yellow, let it mellow, if it’s brown, flush it down.” Believe me, this hunkering down and waiting the storm out was nerve-racking, and WNYC, though we love it, is tiring on 24/7 basis. Looking out the window on near empty streets, locked up stores, with no cars moving is spooky and reminds one of those horror movies of ragged humans surviving the Apocalypse. Ditto, walking on pitch black hallways and stairs for exercise, saying hello to inquisitive floor mates, flashlight in hand, clutching the banister. In two days three neighbor ladies knocked at the door, inquiring about our health, and about borrowing batteries and bath water. We declined the opportunity for a joint expedition outside, the 300 steps down, and then back up would be too much. We were prisoners of our high riser, and shuddered thinking of the people in the real 52 story skyscrapers near Carnegie Hall, where the broken construction gear hanging down threatened the entire neighborhood. Fortunately, in Brooklyn our athletic son found a way to drive across the East River and take us, our two cats and suitcases down the stairs. We borrowed the car and drove upstate to our cabin near Albany, which lost five trees to Hurricane Irene in 2011, worrying about broken pines on the road. But it was fine and the storm had barely touched, and the heat came on, as did the TV, although the news was scary. Only Governor Chris Christy and President Barak Obama, in one brief human moment, made it possible to dream that maybe some day soon there will be a United States with cooperation and compassion, instead of political parties , like jungle animals, baring their teeth at each other and crouching in the jungle , ready to leap at each other. The Star Wars-type term “garbage planet Earth” came up somewhere, reminding one that there are people who sacrifice the health of this one and only universe we have, for short-term profit. The old Gov Mitt Romney knew it, but now he has forgotten. And the animals in the jungle are ready to cut Christie’s throat. About the same time, call it the brief rebirth of humanity say, the lights came back in my high riser, and in a lot more of lower Manhattan. Alas, no heat and hot water, as announced by ConEd, maybe not until November 11. Alas, there were no lights in poor suffering Stuyvesant Town, where the Avenue C-side garage holds the family car, inaccessible. Worse, we known not whether it was destroyed by a high wave washing into ST/PCV, rated Zone B, the garage company , heard from via SP?PCV bulletin on the internet now recommends advising the insurance company. Incidentally, this series of events recommends everybody, even not company- literate elders, get on Internet. E-mail is child’s play, compared to iPhone, and it retains records. If your apartment management does not recommend it, they are negligent fools, and if you do not accept it and act accordingly, you are worse. It is self defense, we live in perilous times and if you do not defend yourself with instant information, offered free, you can become a burden to society. The Staten Island and Jersey Shore people who did not heed and take care of themselves and evacuate, have themselves to blame. Screaming at society when your neglect brought on the suffering is wrong. Good luck to the President elected on Nov. 6, and may we all again learn to live with each other, and let social benefit be the guiding light.