When I rode the subway up to Times Square last Saturday to answer the call to “occupy” it, I found myself out on the streets doing something I hadn’t done in decades.

The old joke for people like me back in the 70s was, Don’t worry, the 60’s will come around again — in about 100 years.

Now, it turns out, it’s only taken about half that time.

If you don’t do politics, politics gets done to you. So let’s do some together right now.

Two years ago many here in the Lefty Tribe had decided we’d had enough. The result was an historical election. This year, it’s the Tea Party people who’ve had enough, and they seem poised to shift things back their way.

Today I want to talk about balance.

I’m easily knocked off balance whenever I’m living off balance to begin with.

By this I mean the balance between work and play, and also my need to live just for today, and also for tomorrow.

Our mother is hemorrhaging in the Gulf of Mexico.

We stab her regularly for her blood. We’ve become like vampires, unable to survive without it.

We want it, and now she’s giving it to us.

I’m trying to deal with the daily shock and dismay of encountering my mirror going “Nyah, nyah!” at me in the morning.

I wonder if there’s a way to turn time around, or turn the tables on it, ‘til it’s on my side.

Radical Amazement is allowing ourselves to lose all control; to be stripped of our ironic defenses and critical fences and let ourselves be swallowed up and feasted on by the gods of Holy Fuck! It is only then that we can experience the Power of Wow.

Today I want to write about olderphobia and its cure. I define olderphobia as a fear of growing older, or a fear of older people. But I repeat myself.

A married couple seeing me for counseling a while back asked, “What do we do when things have been going great, and then we have a fight and suddenly everything looks shitty again? How do we get back to the good feeling?” The answer I gave them was not what they expected.