This tree is at the entrance to the Montague Farm that once housed us and the offices of Zen Peacemakers. The top photo shows the tree a week ago, and the one below shows it now, bringing two reflections to mind:

The first has to do with the two hurricanes that hit Florida and North Carolina. It’s unbelievable to hear from friends that, even when their homes survive, they still have to leave and find short-term housing elsewhere because water and power won’t be restored for months. I have jobs to do during this gorgeous fall (still warm days and way colder nights): bring in plants, hummingbird feeders, table and chairs, a billion leaves later on. Lots of work this season, lots of beauty, but no lack of essential services and no one moving anywhere.

The second has to do with how we reveal ourselves. First slight variations, then hints at the edges, one side changed and the other still green, then a blaze of glory, followed by some fading, then more fading. To us it looks like different stages of a New England autumn, but it’s one living/dying process depending on circumstances. The leaves don’t change colors; yellow, orange and red are always there, but they appear only when the leaves stop making chlorophyl. It’s getting colder, the sun is further away, the green fades, and colors that were always there emerge.

Like many people, I have concern over the coming election. I’m not much of a worrier (or warrior, for that matter), but I’m clear that it’s important that Kamala Harris win. My concern lies with the sense of blankness I get when I watch her, her cautiousness, her lack of taking risks or going out on a limb with anything that can be seen as minimally controversial, trying to negotiate a fine line so as not to offend anyone.

Her strategy reminds me of Hillary Clinton’s in 2016. While Kamala projects more warmth and Hillary was way more guarded, they both show too much caution, too much politics by committee.

Politicians, especially those high up on the ticket, are not like you and me. They have learned to put on a special face to the public, always lively, always smiling, exuding a constant intense energy, never showing fatigue or overwhelm. In that way they’re a lot like major singers or actors, a certain face you put on the minute you walk out the front door of your home.

Once, like maybe in the 1950s, boring people ran for office. They were often studious and bland, not necessarily attractive or eloquent, but who cared? If they were long-time public servants, like Joe Biden, we had a sense of who they were and what they stood for. If they were fairly new on the scene, we’d read the newspapers to discover the party’s platform and what they were promising.

I don’t think that’s been true since the 1960s debate between Richard Nixon and John Kennedy. I’m old enough to remember how pale, tired, unshaven, and somewhat monotonic Nixon was, especially debating with a tanned, healthy, witty Kennedy with his charming Boston Brahmin accent.

I felt that David Brooks’ column in The New York Times captured this very well. He explores the question of what folks, in this age of mass entertainment and the emergence of relatively inexperienced politicians, resonate with, and the answer is that they resonate with a story, with someone facing challenge/adversity, and overcoming it. They don’t resonate with information or observations. They don’t resonate with someone who doesn’t share their process, who doesn’t share what makes her her.

You can evoke Kamala’s very appearance (a woman of color, daughter of immigrants, etc.), but that’s not telling enough of a story. When Barack Obama ran for president, I wanted Hillary Clinton to win the nomination. What won me over was his book, Dreams of My Father. because it gave me a sense of him, what mattered to him, why he went on this search, his different family members, his upbringing by a white mother and white grandparents in Hawaii, his efforts to blend in as Barry and then becoming Barack.

Wow, I thought to myself (after 8 years of George Bush), what a man to have in the White House! A man who sees his life as a journey and can articulate it intelligently.

I wish Kamala could show some of this, which would also help to distinguish her from Joe Biden.

We might wish we were back in the pre-Nixon/Kennedy age, but we don’t read so much as watch the candidates. We want to be won over; we want the candidate not just to tell, but even be, a good story.

Kamala Harris is running against a master showman. My disagreeing with him doesn’t change the fact that he has shown enormous skill at commandeering the airwaves and headlines. He doesn’t care if you like him or hate him because, either way, he has your attention. Nobody can say that Donald Trump is a blank. He strikes out with the most outlandish claims because he wants to be on your TV screen day and night, not unlike the same advertisements that appear again and again, which you might think is overkill but marketing has proven otherwise.

Donald Trump doesn’t worry about being reasonable or knowledgeable or even good, he projects the image of the eternal fighter. His best performance took place after the first assassination attempt on his life, when he recovered enough poise to shake his fist in the air as Secret Service people were bundling him away to safety. Wow, I thought to myself grudgingly, what a showman! He’s always fighting. Many people, despite their better judgment, respect that about him. At the very least, they feel they know him.

They don’t feel they know Kamala.

“If you look at her website,” a friend pointed out, “she lists what her campaign is about and what she plans to do as President.” True enough, but you don’t get a sense of a human being from bullet points.

A good personal story is not necessary for serving as president, but it’s becoming more and more necessary to win an election. I’m not looking for another show person with theatrical instincts. I only wish that Kamala Harris would be less of a cipher, that she share herself more fully, that she seek less shelter in generalizations and trust more the personal, that she lose her fear of giving offense and the efforts to please everyone. That she not be afraid to adopt a minority opinion, as did Maggie Thatcher, Britain’s Iron Lady. That she not fit in with many misogynists’ opinions that women may be smart but too placating, too passive, always playing it safe.

I want to tell her: “Under all that warmth and laughter, which I appreciate, you’re a strong, even tough person. Stop depending on Donald Trump burning his own bridges, that was a big mistake in 2016. Go for it. Go all out!”