*what would you think if i sang out of tune
would you stand up and walk out on me?
lend me your ears and i’ll sing you a song
and i’ll try not to sing out of key

oh i get by with a little help from my friends
mmm i get high with a little help from my friends…

we are settling into our post-sandy, post election and almost (hopefully) post-mayan end of the world prediction lives. feeling relieved it’s more or less behind us? me too. i guess i’m also feeling kind of confident…or maybe the word buoyant is actually more like it.

there’s no question 2012 has been a big one. so many things happened, good and bad, it’s almost hard to organize them. but i hope it’s not the events that will stand out when i look back on this year. i’m not the type to go in for sentimentality, but i think in time i’d like to come to reflect on 2012 as a year of brotherhood. people offering strangers a place to stay, neighbors sharing everything down to the last licks of gas in their tanks and kids learning about putting themselves aside, no matter how much is personally needed, to help someone who needs it more. it is a week before thanksgiving as we are here, late into the night at our beloved HQ, and we are sending the last of these december pages to the printer with this buzzing in our background. we were among the lucky who were able to return to a relatively unscathed workplace, but we did so facing our own challenges, personal tragedies and insecurities, in order to reach out to you, keeping our monthly promise, eddied with the creativity and openness you’ve come to trust from us.

i’m thinking about any of the great tragedies we’ve seen, near or far. it starts with some wave of energy, vacuum and forceful. it sweeps over a place, embroiling the people, washing their things away. but they find out their dreams survive. their handshakes, their smiles continue. this is not new; it’s a cliché because it always happens. and it is true it always happens because it is true of people. patchogue village where i live (and work) dodged the storms. but i saw my neighbors more in the last month than in the last year. we exchanged awe at the natural phenomenon and offered each other gas, tools, wine, information (thank you, russ). and i’m steeled to this place all the more, because i survived with it. i’m not sure i had that before. of course i regret the cost it bore for others, but we do our parts to make corrections. editing the injustices doesn’t take them away, but it does reset the course.

i want to mention what’s in this issue—all that verve and energy that we are about. i want to tell you about the dynamic imagery, and the smart, inspired words, and the creative our advertisers have provided. because our motley cadre of pulse people have worked so hard to fill the book for you, our friend through the pages, with everything that is good, and beautiful and lovely about long island (and a few places afar). but i trust you’ll leaf through for yourself and find the smiles we’ve planted for you.

i want to tell you about all this, but at this frosty twilight moment, some are still without heat. i can’t change that. i can just think about it and maybe be a little nicer on the LIE (though not necessarily slower). i can be a little more patient at the coffee shop. maybe i can even step across the lawn and check on my neighbors a little more often. this is the intangible gift we are all receiving for these holidays. like the hardship, we carry it forward together, into a new year where more bad things will happen, yes, but good things will also be waiting.

so, buoyant, yeah, that’s about right. things were lost, time was lost, some contact might have gotten lost. but here we are—there is no reason to “find” 2012, because it was never lost. (damn, i guess i am feeling sentimental.)

mmm going to try with a little help from my friends,

– nadA

* “with a little help from my friends,” the beatles