Tuesday

What an amazing mess the Democrats are in. I thought that all the billions that Mr. Bloomberg was shelling out would get him nowhere. Now it looks as if it will get him the nod. After all, the top players, Bernie, Mrs. Warren, and Mr. Buttigieg, names who rode high a few hours ago, will be washed out soon enough. Sen. Biden, whose career was killed dead by his son’s greed, will not have much to show for years of campaigning.

So, who will be left? A man with billions to play with, who does not mind playing games with the voters, a man who tells his employees what to eat each day, will be able to tell us all what to eat day by day.

It will be a convention in which money talks VERY LOUDLY. So it looks from here, anyway.

Now, please don’t get me wrong. I admire Bloomberg. He fought in a super-tough league and did well for a long, long time. Does he have a program? Not as far as I can tell. Yes, he claims to have given a lot of jobs to workers, and maybe he did. But how could he have done that and also saved the taxpayers of New York City billions? Come to it, does any Democrat have a program besides claiming to do what Trump did, only more of it?

The Democrats have been running for years now on gusts of rage about Trump. This was their alternative energy source: give us the name Trump, and we’ll make it into treason and perjury and lying of every kind, not to mention “abuse of process,” whatever that might mean.

None of these worked thanks to the power and cunning of the real Trump haters and the basic unlikability of the Democrats.

Now we’re near the end of the election runway, and we cannot see much more runway for the Democrats.

But can Mr. Bloomberg’s billions build an emergency runway for last-minute campaigning? Maybe yes, maybe no. I am reminded of the Navy Seabees who accomplished miracles under fire in the South Pacific. Can someone in the Democrat campaign do the same? I don’t see it, but then there is a lot I don’t see. I didn’t foresee the sudden miracle of Bloomberg. What else don’t I foresee?

Meanwhile, I wake up every morning — and I mean every morning — missing my father and mother so much I can hardly stand up. I knew I was going to miss them when they passed, but I had no idea of how much. I really, really, really miss them. I don’t know what to do with myself day by day. Yes, I have my beautiful sister and super-smart brother-in-law, and they help a lot. But it’s not the same as having Mom and Pop to guide me, criticize me, tell me what I am doing right and doing wrong.

Above all, I have my wife, the world’s most wonderful woman. My wife is a saint. But she is not as interfering as my parents were.

I never thought I would miss them the way I do. I miss their interfering, their cutting me up into little pieces and feeding me to the dogs. Yes, it’s true. I do miss them like insane mania. No, I would not trade my wife for my parents or for anyone else. But I would not want anyone else in my closet but my parents.

What did they have? They could tell me that it would all work out fine, and I would believe them down to my toes. They could tell me that we would not have a new stock market crash, and I would believe them. They could tell me that we would not have another Holocaust, and I would trust them.

Yes, I thought they had supernatural powers, and I believed they did. They were my parents, after all.

Now, they’re gone. My son is still here. So are my daughter-in-law, granddaughter, and nephew, and they’re all super smart, and I trust them. But they’re just flesh and blood. They are not my parents. Oh, well. Enough whining about my parents.

But there are lessons here. Your parents cannot be replaced. Appreciate them. Love them. Pray for them. And soon they will be in your daydreams and night dreams. And they will, in a sense, still be here.

How much we love them if we’re sane. Even if we’re not sane. Pray for your parents and thank God for them night and day.

In the periods intervening, pray in groups for their spirits. And think of Trump as your rough-hewn but super-capable parents were and are.