New Year time for optimism about all that could go wrong
The New Year is about hope and optimism.
While shivering in a world of endless gray, it’s natural to look ahead to the vibrant colors of spring and the bright, warm days of summer. Out of these visions sprout New Year’s resolutions, our commitments to achieve a new life matching the glories of spring and beyond.
For most of us, anyway.
Others worry about all that could go wrong. Rather than pie-in-the sky optimists, they are pie-in-the-face pessimists. They don’t just worry about global warming, they fret that, due to some as yet undiscovered law of cosmology, this year the Earth will change its axis and, as a result, the Northwest will become the new Arctic – and they’re terrified of polar bears. Rather than look forward to the joys of spring and summer, they fear pollen allergies and failing antiperspirant. Instead of making resolutions, they’re dreading what lies ahead.
As I look at 2008 through my second-hand, made-in-China lead-crystal ball, it’s difficult not to become a card-carrying member of this sky-is-falling crowd. Let me explain.
First, there’s the presidential election. Yes, I believe very much in democracy and vote whenever I can. In a recent primary, I wrote in my wife’s name and that of a few friends; it was fun and they all lost, so they still talk to me. Democracy and elections are all well and good, but presidential politics just don’t end in November; they never end. Within a week of the election one or more politicians will say they’re considering running in 2012, 2016 or maybe even 2048, and the process starts over. Presidential politics, like dandelions, are a form of eternal punishment.
Second, there’s the rising cost of gasoline. Now that “light, sweet crude” has crossed the $100-a-barrel threshold, the possibility of fuel reaching $4 a gallon is no longer a question of if but when. The trip computer in my car makes it depressingly easy to calculate the cost of travel to the mall or Hayden, Idaho. While I don’t often go to Hayden, I’m sure I’m not the only one who curses the cost of a wrong turn while trying to get there. If it comes down to a choice between a weekend drive and a couple of lattes, the weekend drive is about to become an endangered species.
Then there’s my third nightmare. While the expression “light, sweet crude” sounds a bit like an expensive dessert that only the very rich can afford, it reminds me instead of several young, female celebrities who continue to act like total jerks. Their escapades made a mockery of the justice system in 2007. Eighty-four minutes in jail? That’s one way of addressing prison overcrowding, all right. America’s global image would dramatically improve if these ladies would wake up and smell the coffee rather than whatever it is they’re inhaling. It’s definitely not common sense.
My last dread? I don’t want to purchase a new TV or converter box for the upcoming switch to high-definition television broadcasts. It’s not just that the format war between HD-DVD and Blu-Ray still rages, it’s the level of complexity you’ve got to sort through to make an intelligent buying decision. I could easily fill a column with TV-related acronyms; it’s an alphabet soup that spells out “expensive.” And I don’t really want to spend thousands of dollars to watch really large advertisements for Metamucil with “crystal-clear picture and lifelike surround sound.”
As if to remind me that change is inexorable, or perhaps because it knew its technological end was near, our 6-year old DVD player passed away on New Year’s Day while playing an episode of HBO’s “From Earth to the Moon.” And it had the last laugh, too. To get the DVD out I had to literally demolish the player, reminding me that the phrase “No user serviceable parts inside” is really a euphemism for “not repairable.”
Considering all these things, is resistance to pessimism futile? The election will come, prices will rise, and there will always be bimbos of either gender. But despite the gloom on the horizon I’m still looking forward to spring and summer.
I think.