Tunes for the Times

When watching the news these days I often think of the Beatles singing “I read the news today, oh boy”. Oh boy, indeed. My vote for song for our times would go to Paul Simon’s “American Tune”, even more relevant now than when it was first recorded.  Then there’s the old saying (said to be a Chinese curse) “May you live in interesting times”. I’d rather live in boring times; boring is soothing and very underrated.

I’m sure the Californians who watched their whole neighborhoods torched by wildfires last month would be happy to be able to spend a boring day in their old house like before. These fires were so horrifying that one fireman described them as like a hurricane with fire rather than water. Rain is desperately needed out west but sudden deluges will cause floods, mudslides and landslides where there are burn scars.

“Fire and Rain” comes to mind for California too, at least the title if not the song itself. But most of all I kept thinking of how bitterly ironic that line from “California Dreamin’” is now: “I’d be safe and warm if I was in LA”. Not all of LA was on fire; it just seemed like it.  California has always had fire/drought periods followed by floods and deadly debris flows, but not like this, with so many people living in the high-risk zones and a population that has doubled in the past few decades.

Many of us around here have vacation memories of happy times spent in California, and others have friends and family there. So even though it’s on the other side of the country, it is very much on our minds. How will it be possible to recover from such a catastrophe and where will all the now-homeless people find a place to live? And what’s going to happen to homeowners’ insurance in the coming days, months, years?

So, I guess I shouldn’t complain about the so-called polar vortex, however much I hate the bitter cold. Then there was that day in late January when New Orleans got a lot more snow than we did, though I know our luck could change at any moment.

But anyone who doesn’t think the weather hasn’t become more extreme is not paying attention or is in denial. Of course, there have always been weather disasters all over the world, but they never seem to have come so thick and fast. Hurricane-force winds ravaged Ireland and England in January too, causing great damage, and there have been too many floods all over the world to keep track of.

Meanwhile, closer to home, my concerns are much more mundane. There’s a bit of a buzz around both a Whole Foods and a Market Basket (something for everyone) opening in a year or so in Seekonk. The general reaction seems to be Yay! followed by “What’s the traffic going to be like?” Traffic is already backed up on Rt. 6 and adjoining streets at certain times.

A Market Basket located between Target and Walmart? I guess in the future I’ll have to get to the stores as soon as they open on a Tuesday morning. Forget the weekend. And yet in certain spots, Rt. 6 is nothing but a long line of abandoned stores and businesses. The Showcase Cinema (closed a few weeks ago) looks forlorn sitting there empty awaiting its fate. On the other hand, I haven’t been inside a movie theater since before the pandemic.

In animal news, Chinese New Year marks the Year of the Snake, my least favorite animal. Make of that what you will. Then there’s poor Punxsutawney Phil who is dragged out of a sound sleep in the midst of hibernation every February 2 to predict the coming of Spring. Last year one of Phil’s cousins bit his/her handler on Groundhog Day. Let sleeping groundhogs lie.

It’s a quaint old custom but the poor rodent doesn’t have a degree in meteorology. And why is it a groundhog on February 2 and a woodchuck when it’s getting into people’s gardens in the summer? In any event, these critters know no more than we do about the coming of spring. It’s usually six more weeks of winter around here anyway. From my point of view, Spring can’t come soon enough, bringing Daylight Savings Time with it. I’d rather we were all singing along to “Here Comes the Sun.”