|
|
David Spates Why do you expect I wanted to start off the new millennium with
a whiz-bang column. I had hopes of a column so good that it would
cause temporary paralysis and sporadic pant-wetting in you, the
reader. A column of such magnificence that you'd succumb to an
uncontrollable urge to call your mother and apologize for the
lies you told as a teen-ager. It was to have been a column that
would have made grown men sob, young girls swoon and farm animals
collapse. A column so grand and profound it, if read aloud with
the proper inflection, could affect matter on the subatomic level. My first column of the new millennium should
have been all of that, but we're already into the second paragraph
and it's painfully obvious that it just isn't working out that
way. Grand expectations -- in the toilet. But why would you or I expect anything substantially
different just because the new millennium is here? (And, by the
way, the new millennium did start Monday, not last year as the
Y2K-panicky lemmings would have had you believe. It's that whole
there's-no-year-zero argument.) It's just another column written
in just another newspaper in just another town in just another
country in just another year in just another millennium. Greatness
will not spontaneously appear simply because the Christian calendar's
odometer rolled over. I understand, however, that we humans do enjoy
a good landmark, whether it affects us or not. We like nice,
round numbers and "the new ..." whatevers. I know 2001
is not a nice, round number but it is a new millennium. We mark
things like wedding days, even though the actual wedding day
is little more than an official declaration of a commitment that
the two people made some time ago. We like birthdays, too, as if somehow the
anniversary of one's birth has any bearing on much of anything.
It's just another number like your weight, blood pressure, cholesterol
level or hair length, but unlike those four numbers you can't
do anything to change your age. I think we should cancel birthday
parties and start throwing parties when people reach certain
weights. That would be pretty cool, and it certainly would make
the ice cream and cake more meaningful. Drop 10 pounds, throw a party! Drop 20 pounds, throw another party! Drop 50 pounds, throw a monster party! Drop 100 pounds, throw a bash so wild that
the police will have to call the National Guard for assistance. Getting old isn't impressive. You couldn't
stop birthdays if you tried. Parents could use the reverse for their children.
Throw a party when your child reaches 10 pounds, 20 pounds, 50
pounds, 75 pounds, 100 pounds or whatever. If a child wanted
to be sneaky about it, he could hit the 75-pound plateau, enjoy
his weight party, exercise really hard to lose five pounds, then
gain it back and then enjoy another party. On second thought,
that might encourage some rather unhealthy habits. The fewer
teens we have binging and purging the better, I say. I'll have
to work on that idea a little further. Call it a notion in its
infancy. So with all of that being said, why isn't
the first column of the new millennium any better than this?
Well, you simply cannot dictate when greatness will strike. Just
because the year changed to 2001 doesn't mean special things
are going to happen. Magnificence doesn't conform to publication
deadlines -- true greatness is unpredictable. We're left to live each day as it comes. Today's column is what it is, and who knows what next week's column will bring or the next one or the next one. Carpe diem. Seize the day. Enjoy what you have before you and work to make tomorrow even better. That goes for hack columns and millenniums alike. |