First snow and a comedy crisis

By Aditha DISSANAYAKE in New York

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When you are in a strange land, a land where people dress their dogs in jackets and socks, where billboards urge you to get a divorce because it costs only $300, where a loaf of bread costs 310 in Sri Lankan rupees, the only comforting thing at times is the sky. The sky, white or gray or black, speckled with clouds which look like blobs of vanilla ice cream, or studded with stars and looking like a velvet dress with gold buttons on it - always the same, always there, making you grin and tell yourself well..at least the sky is the sky all over the world.

What a comfort it is to wake up in the morning on my mattress on the third floor of an apartment in Flushing to see this familiar friendly scene ,outside my window. The few seconds spent gazing at the blue or grey blanket are special before I spring to my feet from the floor; beds being a distant luxury for students living in unfurnished apartments in New York, whence even prominent art critics like Jed Pearl was once f—— poor as he described in a lecture recently, for this is one way I can bond with those who are close to my heart back at home. Though it would be night for you, the sky would be there for you too, in much the same way it is there for me now.

But what a surprise it was to wake up yesterday to find this familiar scene changed beyond description. The sky was literary falling outside my window. Torn to smithereens. Small white specks fell all around me as though someone had fed the white clouds into a shredding machine.

Snow. When I thrust my hand out of the window they melted the moment they fell on my palm reminding me yet again of the Buddha’s philosophy , nothing in this life lasts forever.

Impermanence. This is surely the best word to describe the scene that greets you when you step outside into the cold, gloomy weather in New York these days. The trees which had only a few weeks ago looked like marquees at a banquet dressed in yellow, orange and red dresses, are now stripped of their finery and look sad, old, desolate. Death and decay hover like a gloomy shroud which wraps around you and wills you too to be equally gloomy.

The only comforting thought is the knowledge that spring cannot be far behind. Spring and changes. Especially changes brought about by the new President - Barack Obama. Optimism is high the economic crisis will soon be solved and that the predictions of the Greatest Depression ever will remain confined to the imagination of pessimists.Yet, there is a crisis which the new president may not be able to resolve. A funny crisis so to say, not in funny as in strange but funny as in...well...funny kind of way. To say it simply, a comedy crisis.

As the Onion, a newspaper which claims with tongue in cheek to be America’s finest news source predicts with Barack Obama as President, hard times are ahead for comedians. Political cartoonists of the print media and writers who keep regular columns ridiculing the rulers are said to be biting their nails wondering aloud “Just how do you joke about Obama?”. Bill Maher, the comedian who hosts the talk show called Real Time laments “Here’s a guy who’s not fat, not cheating on his wife, not stupid, not angry, and not a phony. Who needs someone like this around for the next four years?”. Craig Ferguson, the host on CBS’s Late,Late, Show, too, asks” A dignified African-American man.

What the h—- can I do with that?” and gives the answer himself. “My only hope is Biden” while the Emmy Award Winning stand-up comedian Jay Leno says ‘As a comedian I am going to miss President Bush. Barack Obama is not easy to do jokes about. He doesn’t give you a lot to go on”. But Leno too agrees with Ferguson, and doubtless other comedians that if all else fails Joe Biden will save them. So much for the comedy crisis. Looks as though Barack Obama is going to skate through the winter like a prince in a fairy-tale, though slightly darker in colour.

As for the sky literally falling into pieces outside my window...well the snow has ceased now and I see the familiar gray blanket I have got used to seeing ever since the winds of change began to blow in October. Chances are, as you read this today the sky outside your window will be as blue as a nil manel. Spare a moment to look at it.Because, though it is night here, I will be looking at it, thinking of you. Yes, dear readers, I miss you...adieu till we shall connect again, from key-board to the Sunday Observer, sky to sky.