With their baseball caps and matching weatherproof/waterproof jackets, wind blowing in their faces and tiny white caps meandering by, always reminding us, of just how far away, the waterfront once was about 15 minutes ago, of course handling all kinds of electrical cords, with an unseen human’s hand wiping away the soot and sand, the champions of Tornado or Hurricane hunters, re-imagine the disaster for which real people, not dressed with smear-proof makeup, or the latest disaster attire, must endure, have endured, and are perseverating will eventually arrive. And like most every bit of news, since the invention of 24/7, which attempts to tell the story honestly,(fails miserably) all we have on live television is a scripted REALITY SHOW, with the sad monologues from those affected, those who swear as long as they have lived in that, there house and neighborhood, NOTHING like this has ever happened. And then for the real DRAMA, these “weather people,” place themselves in the most idiotic of situations, almost gleaming with joy that this newest DISASTER might create the HERO, they ALL seek to be!
What is true, what should be heard and said, and what IS really happening diverge on top of one another, and all we receive are the gasps of horror, the tears, of destruction, and the morbid, sad woodwind minor keys, of some kind of EMERGENCY serenade, just to make this moment even more full of morose and madness. Of course, when the disaster is not a home-grown event, the obligatory, and usually deeper pitched responses as photos from helicopters fly by, or the four-wheeled vehicles, owned by some News Network, have the Reality Stars, providing, in even more sad voices, and shaking of heads, their canned tsk, tsk, tsk, and the reminder that whichever this nation might be, will NEVER, EVER, NEVER be the same. And once there is no longer the need for the hype or the heroics, regarding the doom and devastation, the newly homeless, hapless, and helpless peasants are gone and forgotten. Until, of course, the next once in a generation weather catastrophe, happens a few weeks later. It is a little like the actions most news networks take when yet one more mass shooting reoccurs, and of course the morbid theme plays in the background, this time only in casual wear (never report on premeditated murder or death and dying, without rolling up your sleeves, or wearing some outfit with the Logo of your news station placed on a prominent part of your anatomy!
I am of course cynical, I am hesitant, and I am overwhelmed with the rush of “see it here first,” and THEN, “the following actions of you what you JUST saw, forget that, because, now it is time to move on. To keep REALITY relevant, you gotta find more REALITY fodder, which once the wind blows, the fodder which is nothing but peat moss and wood chips, blow away or just leave their odious odor wafting wildly! Reality has become as ambivalent and irrelevant.
I often wonder why what we watch, you know the shows with prominent Anchors, prestigious Talking Heads, callous Commentators is called NEWS. Facts are so far-fetched any longer and are instead just fluff-filled sketches (like the kind we see on Saturday Night Live, only full of with caloric fiction, making your gut fat, but starving your brain. I mean we spent talking about Trump wanting to Nuke the approaching Hurricane, and that bit chicanery lasted for a long time, and the mere insistence that only Trump and his adopted brother Jesus, knew Dorian was headed for Alabama! Weather people, misery does not enjoy company, those in misery are truly the ones who suffer!
