I’m losing stuff around the house, and I’m not talking about the normal things one can’t find, such as a single sock in the laundry. I actually solved that problem several years ago by safety pinning pairs of socks together. My current laundry loss is one of those plastic dryer balls that replace the chemical dryer sheets like Bounce we used to put in with the laundry. The spiked dryer balls tend to hide in the folds of fitted sheets, but I searched all my bed linens to no avail. Weird.
Also strange are the nearly empty water jugs I kept in the basement following last year’s storms that cut power in many areas. Survival experts suggested you keep several gallons of water on hand, so I dutifully bought a couple of two-gallon plastic containers of water to store in the basement. Last week I noticed they were almost empty. No telltale puddles or water marks around them. So much for disaster preparedness.
If Mitt Romney wins the election he’s expressed a commitment to eliminate funding for Public Broadcasting Service, including Sesame Street and its signature character, Big Bird. Putting aside the left-wing mind-control argument Republicans have postulated about Sesame Street, the now 43-year-old children’s educational program has been a fount of early learning.
When one of our nephews was a toddler, his mother sat him in front of the television to watch the then new show. Some months later, he stunned her by reading the label of a cereal box. As she and her husband had not practiced reading with him, the only explanation was Sesame Street.
Gilda and I employed Sesame Street when our kids were young. Saturday mornings we’d let Dan and Ellie watch Sesame Street and Electric Company as we lounged in bed. We, along with tens of thousands of other parents, protested when PBS changed its Saturday morning programming from kid-friendly to politics and business shows. I think we might have stopped sending money to PBS for a while.
Over the Columbus Day weekend Gilda and I visited Dan, Allison, Finley and Dagny in their new home in Acton, Mass. They live in the Fifth Congressional District represented by Niki Tsongas, widow of Paul Tsongas, the former U.S. Senator and one-time Democratic presidential hopeful. I met both of them during a business trip to New Hampshire in early 1992.
Before boarding the shuttle flight to Boston from LaGuardia, I recognized Tsongas. As luck would have it, I sat across the aisle from him. But he never looked my way during our time waiting for takeoff. His body was shifted toward his wife’s window seat. I’m notorious for falling asleep on airplanes even before getting airborne, so I fretted about missing an opportunity to talk with him.
I tried to stay awake by reading The NY Times. I was midway through the first section of the paper when I saw my opportunity. After finishing an article on Tsongas’ chances in the upcoming New Hampshire primary, I tapped him on the shoulder and said I couldn’t resist talking to the man profiled in the article I had just read. He was most gracious. We chatted for several minutes. When I told him I was headed to New Hampshire, he joked he had spent some time there himself.
Last night while watching the Yankees-Orioles playoff baseball game, I believe I heard John Smoltz, one of the announcers, say he wanted to get a ride on one of the blimps providing overhead shots of the game and surroundings. I can empathize with him.
Back in 1972, as part of a graduate journalism program at the Newhouse School of Public Communications of Syracuse University, my class covered the Florida presidential primary. We were stationed in Miami. I was assigned to follow the campaign of John Ashbrook, a conservative Republican congressman from Ohio. He had little chance of winning, especially in the Miami area, so I had lots of free time. Two of my classmates and I came upon the Goodyear blimp moored at a field. The blimp was there for coverage of a sporting event some days later. We talked up the crew who promised us a free ride the next day. When we arrived Tuesday morning at the mooring site, the blimp was not there. Seems Walter Cronkite’s crew had been ordered to film Miami vistas for that evening’s election coverage. I never forgave Cronkite for pre-empting my chance to float in air.
There’s a truism in sports—never let a weaker opponent stick around. Score points early and often, so they’ll be discouraged and give up. If you let them hang around, they could surprise you and win. What’s true of sports is also true of politics. Barack Obama, an avid sports fan, has just learned the truth of that aphorism with his lackadaisical performance during last week’s debate with Romney.
What possessed him to breathe new life into his opponent’s chances is beyond anyone’s analytic powers. Perhaps he himself can’t explain why he played the debate the way he did. I can’t explain it any more than I can explain where my dryer ball disappeared to or why there was no telltale sign of my stored water. I can replace the dryer ball and the water. The question is, can Obama replace the lost affection and momentum among his supporters and undecided voters?
