For the record, 2009 can suck it. While I don't think this past year could be listed as the worst year, it's certainly not ever going to be listed in the same zip code as some of the best. I've lost friends and family this year. People I know have also had their share of loss and setbacks. When I think about it this past year has been more about things happening around me rather than things happening to me. Considering 2009 felt like it was full of death and sadness, maybe it's not exactly a bad thing. Still, there was an undeniable sense of being idle for way too long. It wasn't until very near the end that things actually started to pick up a little bit for me. I feel like I'm standing in the eye of the tornado. For me it's very calm, but around me there is a whirling mass of destruction.
Ten years ago I was leaving this place and heading off to start a new adventure in a brand new state. I was young and eager to try something different. College had only finished the year before and it was time to leave for a new world beyond what I had known while I was in school. I often wonder what my life would have been like had I not taken that leap. A huge portion of my life would be drastically different. I don't regret doing it, but it's natural to think about the road not taken. That was then and this is now and to be honest it's really hard to tell the difference between my then self and now self. Back then I felt as though I was starting over and here I am feeling that same way. I've circled back around to where it feels like I'm starting over again. Maybe it's a good thing for me, but it's also more than a little frustrating because I have a tendency to pre-worry (a term coined by a friend of mine) about things long before I need to. So in addition to feeling like I'm living through the Pink Floyd lyrics "Ten years have got behind you. No one told you when to run. You missed the starting gun", I'm worried that if I'm not careful I'll be right back here in another ten years.
Now all of 2009 wasn't bad. There were actually a lot of good things. Several family members have started new aspects of their lives, be it retiring from a job after years of service or leaving the military to try and sort out what it's like to be a civilian again. And my best friend lost her job after more than a dozen years at the same company only to find an even better job a few months later. Some relationships ended while others started and some even made the leap to that next step. I took the safe route of staying single, although I'm starting to wonder how much of that is by choice and how much is just a bad habit of not trying.
As usual there seemed to be a lot of celebrity deaths. Several of which were surprising at the time. Others may have not been shocking, but were still sad. This year we lost a dirty dancing roadhouse bouncer, one of Charlie's Angels, a prisoner, a man who told us the rest of the story, the king of pop, Khan himself, and the one who said that's the way it is. And to add to all that we lost another Karl with a K when we live in a world where it seems like there are simply too few. It seems like a lot and it probably is, but it's probably not all that different from years before as far as numbers are concerned.
The thing that's strange to me is that we're about to enter 2010, the year we make contact, and yet it feels like we're still arguing over the same old issues for the sake of arguing. Social and scientific issues are still being debated to the point that nothing gets done and the conspiracy theorist in me wonders if that's not exactly how someone wants it. In some ways I wonder if we're not going backwards in some aspects. People are fighting battles that were "won" more than 30 years ago. And some people are fighting battles that should have ended 30 years ago. Having had my fair share of arguments and all out fights about things, I've learned that sometimes it's no good to win the battle if you lose the war. It seems it many cases there are those who would simply rather fight because they see any kind of compromise as a lose-lose situation. Or at the very least they had to give up something. There was a social experiment where a person is given $100 and are told to share a portion of the money with a second person. They can offer any amount, but if the other person refuses they both get nothing. Depending on your logic you may say that the most likely acceptance would be a 50-50 split of the money. Others might think that the second person should be happy with any portion of money because no matter what percentage they get it will still be 100% more than they had. More often than not the people making the laws are willing to walk away with nothing if they can't keep all $100. There's a reason why the acronym for mutually assured destruction is MAD.
Overall 2009 felt like a year that you just had to survive. Anything beyond that was just a bonus. I'd like to be hopeful for 2010, even if it's only because the year itself sounds much better than any of the 00s, which no one found a good name for in ten years. Do I think things will be drastically different than the last year? Maybe not, but I'm still looking forward to what it has to offer.
