President Barack Obama and Gov. Chris Christie (aka my Chief Pretend Boyfriend) during my CPB’s finest hour, Hurricane Sandy’s aftermath, Oct. 31, 2012, Brigantine Beach, N.J. Photograph courtesy of the White House.
Thank goodness I have Rafael Nadal as my BPB (Backup Pretend Boyfriend) since I may have to demote Gov. Chris Christie from CPB (Chief Pretend Boyfriend).
Gov. Krispy Kreme – as I affectionately like to call him – is in deep political doodoo after his henchmen (oh, sorry, aides) apparently sought revenge on Fort Lee, N.J. Mayor Mark Sokolich by snarling traffic on his city’s stretch of the George Washington Bridge after he declined to support their boss’ bid for gubernatorial reelection. It is a measure of how far our civilization has come, or fallen, that men now avenge themselves not by decapitation or declaring war but by traffic jams – although if you’ve ever sat in one on the GWB, you might be yearning for the guillotine.
More is at stake here, of course, than Gov. Krispy Kreme’s potential presidential candidacy. There’s the whole issue of a relationship that exists only in my mind. Ever since he burst onto the scene, I have felt that we were kindred spirits. Our love of food, our penchant for pink shirts, our passion for the Jersey Shore, our crush on Bruce Springsteen – ah! I imagined soft summer nights under the boardwalk down by the sea – to borrow from a few songs. Gov. Krispy Kreme and I would be making like Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr in “From Here To Eternity,” the waves crashes about our thrashing bodies, the rills of foam caressing our voluptuous limbs, although in reality it might be more like two beached whales flopping about.
Now I might have to rush headlong into the muscular arms of Rafa, although I have been cheating on him of late with his frenemy, Novak Djokovic, much as Anna Wintour has been cheating on Roger Federer – aka Feddy Bear – with Nole, who begins his title defense at the Australian Open next week.
We jest here, but passion – be it political or sexual – takes itself very seriously, and therein lies the problem. In my novel “Water Music” – which officially bows Tuesday, Jan. 14 – the main characters are passionate about being the best, so much so that it leads to betrayal, revenge, heartache and loss.
Who’s been hurt by l’affaire Christie? Not Sokolich, who’s come off smelling like the proverbial rose as the aggrieved leader of an aggrieved community. No, the innocent have been hurt, including schoolchildren who sat in that traffic. As have the gubernatorial cronies who perpetrated the comeuppance. And the governor himself.
“Ah, my little CPB,” I long to tell Gov. Krispy Kreme, “vengeance is the Lord’s for a reason.
“It will only come back to bite us in our considerable butts.”