Bob Marley "Ambush In The Night"

Here are some things that happened while I tried to "get out the vote" and "get of of my house," yesterday morning . . .

My wife had to leave the house super-early, because she remembered last-minute that she had an early meeting.  This meant I was completely in charge of getting the kids ready to leave the house for the day.

My 2 year old loves peanut butter.  So I asked him if he wanted peanut butter on a bagel for breakfast.  He said yes, so I put peanut butter on a bagel.  He protested.  "Not peanut butter on top!"  It took me a few tries, but I figured out what he wanted.  He wanted an sandwich.  He didn't want the peanut butter on top, he wanted it in the middle.  Being the practical sort, I just took the two halves, squished them together and made a sandwich.  Unfortunately, he had seen that the peanut butter was actually on top, and could not unsee this horror.  He sobbed for 10 minutes, saying "Not peanut butter on top!"  I was unable to convince him that the peanut butter was now in the middle.  In his mind, it was forever on top, and he could never eat such an abomination.

Not only did my wife have to work early, she was going to have to work late.  So late, that she was not going to be able to pick up our almost-5 year old at her pre-school at pick-up time.  The solution was that I would take my daughter to work Tuesday.  The night before, Mom and daughter had gone shopping, and had spied a heavily discounted Halloween costume.  For 5 bucks, why not?  It seemed like a good idea at the time.  But on Tuesday morning, my daughter insisted that only suitable outfit for "Going To Work With Daddy" Day, was a cupcake costume complete with a cherry-on-top hat.  Did I really want to get in a yelling/crying standoff with a giant rainbow sprinkle covered cupcake?  "Choose your battles," the saying goes.

Amid these two mini-dramas, the friggin' cat was driving me crazy.  She's 18 years old (though she doesn't look it), and I was wondering if she was having senior moment.  Inside.  Outside.  Inside.  Outside.  She kept coming in and out of the kitchen slider, each time letting stiff morning chill shoot through the room.  And she kept meowing, Meowing, MEOWING!  "What is your beef, kitty!?"  I kept asking her.  On the shopping trip that yielding the cupcake costume, my wife had also bought some fancy-shmancy catfood---the kind that comes in gravy that actually looks kinda good---and I figured kitty was agitating for another bowl after she'd inhaled the first.  Hey, at least someone ate breakfast, right?  But what's with all the meowing and discontent?

So as I'm running out of time to get out the door, get the boy to daycare and get to work, plus squeeze in voting before the drop offs, the full on chaos begins as my daughter has decided to fulfill my request to "bring a toy you'd like to play with" by picking out, I dunno, an anvil or something insanely heavy and my son is furious because he sees his sister packing a backpack and realizes HE'S not packing a backpack and hell if I know where his Elmo backpack is and as I'm stomping through the house looking for it I'm muttering "why is it my responsibility to know where you throw your shit?" . . . I step in shit.  Or vomit.  I'm not sure.

Yeah, I misread the cat's issue.  Not a senior moment.  Diarrhea.  She was meowing because she was in gastro-intestinal distress.  And I stepped in it barefoot.

So yeah, I lost my cool and it took another 10 minutes to clean up, marshal all the kids' shit (not the literal kind of shit, just the kind of shit you put in a backpack) and hope that I could get in and out of the polling place so I was not late for everything else that I had to do that day.


Monday evening (the night before) . . .

As I've mentioned in previous posts, mvyradio has a trade with Adam Cab, for various reason, you might find a staffer catching a ride in one of their vans.  As I have also mentioned, a number of their drivers are Jamaicans.

So I was riding with one of the Jamaican drivers on Monday evening, and he was talking about how this was his last week---it's that time of year on the Vineyard, when our foreign workers are coming to the end of their visas.  They'll depart over the course of the next month, ready to return in April or May for another season.

I asked him what he'd be doing in Jamaica for the winter, and he said, "nut-ting to speak uf."  I asked if he'd come back for another season on the Island and he said, "I 'ope so.  We see what 'appens tomorrow."  He expressed concern that if Romney were elected, he might place tighter restrictions on Visas to protect American jobs.

As we drove through the darkened, quiet daylight-savings-is-over and the-season-is-over empty streets, he marveled, "The streets are quiet tonight, sir.  The night before an election?  Is not like this at home . . ."

I asked him what it is like.

"Tense.  Vera tense."  He went on, "People with guns go into neighborhoods of the opposition.  Try to intimidate 'em.  Lotta lives lost."

He paused, and then he said it again to make sure I heard it, "Lotta lives lost . . ."


Back to Tuesday morning . . .

I had slept soundly the night before.  There were no hazards to navigate, inside or outside the polling place.  I chose candidates that I have confidence in.  I left and went about my day.

Daycare schedule changes, peanut butter sandwiches, missing backpacks, sartorial dessert-orial decisions and cat diarrhea---these were first world problems, not anything to get hung up about.

I voted Tuesday.  And I felt lucky.


Here's a lesser know Bob Marley song, in which he address being shot in 1976, possibly for political reasons.  Go to the Youtube page to see the lyrics.


Hear the song and read the lyrics on Youtube.