December 14, 2012

Another holiday season, another move. At this point in life, I have done at least 14 interstate moves, with interstate move #15 occurring tomorrow evening. A little over a year ago, I moved back to New York. Within a month of moving back, I ended up in the city's shelter system, and it took over 4 months to get out of that mess. By the end of April, I got a messenger job, and less than a week later, I was back at the rooming house also known as the Oceanview Hotel in Rockaway.

During the time I was a messenger, part of the Northwest section of my hometown burned in something called the Waldo Canyon Fire.

I lost my job after a weeklong stay at Elmhurst Hospital due to a viral skin infection. I had no idea until I after I got out of the hospital that I was unemployed again. While I was recovering from the illness (which took several weeks due to the side effects of the anti-virals), I had to evacuate my home due to a mandatory evacuation order of the Zone A coastal areas of New York City. It was just a precaution, I was told. But most of the people in my neighborhood didn't evacuate. When the storm surge hit Lower Manhattan, it was broadcast live.

It took a few days to discover how badly damaged my neighborhood was. (Check November 5 blog for my photos of the damage.) Thanks to FEMA, I have enough money to resettle. Many who ignored the mandatory evacuation order are now wondering why their aid is delayed if not non-existent. And that's not counting those who didn't live in Zone A and still suffered horrific storm damage. But considering both the city I'm moving to tomorrow and the neighborhood I had to move from both suffered from devastating fires, I wonder if any place is safe. The news this afternoon of what happened outside Danbury in Newtown, CT further questions whether there is such a thing as safety. That situation is still fluid.

And now, people are trying to use this massacre as an excuse to restrict law abiding citizens' rights to own firearms. Do you think a total gun ban would have stopped Adam Lanza from killing people? You think he got his weapons legally? He stole them from his dead mother- whom he killed before the rampage at Sandy Hook Elementary. I guess no place is safe from fires or floods or hurricanes or tornadoes or psychopathic killers- or Obamacare or fiscal insanity or NBC.