In a few days the map pin holding my old fashioned calendar on the wall will automatically drop out and the map of days will fall on the floor. It’s tired, that map pin…it was a heavy year. A lot of us will remember 2015 for a whole lot of unfortunate reasons. And yes there were, no doubt, some damn good times during this year too. That’s the way it is…always. The good things seem to make the bad days seem worse while at the same time they help us get beyond the bad times. Back at the beginning of the summer I was working on a little carpentry project…I smacked my thumb with the hammer…I dropped the damn hammer on the table while I cursed about my thumb…and then the hammer fell off the table onto my foot…double damnation…But see…I almost forgot about my thumb.
I know people are hoping that 2016 will be better than 2015…as if wishing will make it so. I’m not one of those. I can’t see into the future but looking backwards I can’t see anything that would encourage me to believe. O.K. well, Justin Trudeau got elected and the despicable Harper and his malignant minions were banished to vindictive valley of the Official Opposition. The Official Opposition has an old and mostly honourable tradition in our parliamentary system…but I’m pretty sure that the toxic cloud hanging over this opposition will have us all choking many times over the next four years. Still…the odious proctophiles are out and their forked tongues are busy licking their wounds.
But I digress. I’m not expecting 2016 to be better but I’m not expecting it to be worse either. I keep hearing the warlords to our south claiming that the ISickles are done for…and the same time they’re saying that only a few more billions are needed to prop up the colossally corrupt puppet regimes in those ravaged countries. I can’t imagine what kind of diplomatic deal from hell would put ISIS back in the crypt from which it sprang and in fact I can’t imagine that anything positive has been done for the damaged and deluded kids who join those murderous gangs in the first place. So no…I don’t think that the attacks in France or the U.S. or U.K. or Canada or Germany or anywhere, for that matter, will stop in 2016.
I don’t expect the war on drugs to end next year. I certainly don’t see an end to poverty here, there, anywhere. I don’t expect to see water magically appear in drought ridden Africa until most of the people in those parts are dead or gone and the big European agri-businesses buy up the land and plant fruit and vegetables to sell back to Europe. I don’t expect slavery to end…because why would it as long as we can buy boat loads of stuff cheap. And these are all bad things.
There was an accord reached in Paris in 2015 that made some promises to Mother Nature. They’re now wondering where to mail her copy. Personally, I think she’s still plenty pissed off and the paper chase in Paris isn’t going to improve her mood. I’m one of those who think that she’s still carrying a monster rage about those nuclear firecrackers that the Americans and Russians and Chinese and French and who knows who else shot off in the fifties and sixties…”For the good of mankind”. The accord? A step in the right direction.
So…all of this…dismal shit is enough to depress a person. Forget that…we can’t afford depression. We can’t afford despair. We need to be optimistically alert. We need to stay awake and look for opportunities to make it better…and seize them…even if it’s only something little. Mow the fucking lawn…pick up the trash…recycle and bicycle…buy the bum a coffee. Kiss your mother in law…give some asshole the benefit of the doubt. Tell your pals you love them…buy less shit that you don’t need…take care of yourself. Recognize fools for what they are…not who they are. Give yourself a break.
Chagal4's Blog 
Leave a comment