Ding Dong

How do I feel?
Yippie!
Like Snoopy with his nose in the air, his ears in the sky, up on his hind paws doing a dance, while his pal Woodstock flitters excitedly about him.
Woo-hoo!
Like the guy in the clichéd slow-mo scene of the couple on the beach, or at the airport, or on the train platform – running headlong into each other’s arms.
Yeah, Baybee!
Like the two-year old in his high chair doing a face-plant in his birthday cake.
Or like Carlton Fisk hopping up the first base line, using every inch of body English that he has to psychically alter the path of his rising line drive in Game Six of the 75 World Series and then, when the signal is given, hardly touching the ground as he circles the bases.
Curley of the Three Stooges, on his side, rotating round and round: nyuk, nyuk, nyuk.
Pete Townsend, windmilling giant power chords in front of a crowd of thousands.
Or Chuck Berry duck walking across the stage while playing Maybelline.
George Bailey strolling down Main Street in the snow on Christmas Eve.
It is, after all, a wonderful life.
Ding Dong the Mayor is Dead.

Okay, maybe I’m overdoing it a bit.
I know that there is a 100% chance that the Charter-changers will soon be launching a petition drive, and holding a bake sale, and hiring a voodoo doctor, and a priest, and adding to their hit list (and hiring a hit man), and looking up to heaven, beating their breasts and claiming they have been wronged.
I know there is a high likelihood that certain fanatical Charter-heads will succeed once again to – at the very least, muddy the waters, create a stink, turn over a few stones and - when a worm or two is discovered, express their righteous indignation like Jimmy Swaggart after a big night on the town.
I know that Saturday’s vote was in many ways, too good to be true. But I will not have my sunny disposition sullied by what may or may not happen in the coming weeks.
I will not read the comments posted to this online, or the outraged letters to the editor written in blood. And I promise that, under pain of expulsion from the ever-expanding secret cabal of know-it-alls, ambulance chasers, cultists and town meeting members, I will not at any time in the next six months pause in my cable wanderings to listen to.. well, you know who.
I want this feeling to last.
And did you notice? As soon as the vote was concluded Saturday, the sun came out, the birds began to sing, and that long-deferred spring we’ve been aching for, burst forth.
Sunday was an actual sun day.
Monday was Opening Day at Fenway.
Little Leaguers are taking to the fields.
The North Koreans sent up a celebratory rocket.
Metallica was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
“Oh frabjous day, Callooh, Callay”.
Ding Dong, the Mayor is Dead.

(Note: For those of you not here, in America's Home Town, this post may be difficult to relate to. But know this - Plymouth has been in existence for just shy of 400 years, and through all those years it has been governed by a town meeting form of government - with an elected Board of Selectman and annual meetings at which a representative body deliberates on the expenditures for the coming year. Over the last ten years that form of government has been under attack by fans of alleged 'efficiencies'. The recent defeat of the third or fourth attempt to switch to a Mayoral form of government is what prompted this article. Though forward thinking in many ways, I strongly believe that the more people involved in governance, the better, and that especially in this historic community we need to do everything we can to keep the town meeting form of government intact and effective.)