If the Mayans, the Politicos and the Media all have it right, we have a few more weeks until the end of the world as we know it. The Mayan Calendar reports the world will end December 21st on the Winter Solstice. But don’t worry. If it doesn’t happen on the 21st we are falling off a fiscal cliff into an economic abyss in the New Year.
So, maybe I should just kick up my heels and not worry about paying my January bills if the world is coming to an end.
But wait…Wasn’t the world supposed to end with The Rapture on May 21, 2011? And wasn’t the world supposed to have a cataclysmic shift on January 1, 2000, with YTK when computers, clocks, airlines and other mechanical and technical devices would fall into a time warp? I came back to New York early from Bali just in case YTK stopped everything in its tracks, for goodness sake!
I remember growing up hearing about The Iron Curtain on TV. It sure was scary. I envisioned this really dark grey metallic iron curtain clanking down between country borders separating the good people from the bad people (“The Commies”). I remember being told a really mean man in Cuba with a long beard and combat fatigues was aiming his missiles at Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and we were going to all blow up in a nuclear cloud. I remember being told that by voting for Barry Goldwater in my kindergarten class mock presidential election I was jeopardizing the safety of our country. I remember holding a seance with my friends to bring back to bring back President John F. Kennedy and “Camelot” and a hand with a crazy hairy head appeared through the den door (At the other end was my father playing a nasty prank on us with my mother’s wig stand.) I remember thinking “God” looked like the King of Clubs on my grandmother’s playing cards and the King of Spades was the Antichrist. I really wasn’t sure at the age of five what the Antichrist was, but what people on the downtown streets of Chattanooga were saying about this guy made him sound really really bad.
Life sure was scary back then. Of course I grew up and and I was not scared any more. News of gloom and doom really didn’t matter as a teen-ager. Gloom was not getting invited to the prom. Doom was accepting a date to the prom with a total nerd just to be able to go and wear a prom dress. I felt I had the world at my fingertips and opportunities were endless. Wouldn’t it be nice to feel that way all the time?
This year, I’m not going to worried about the fiscal cliff and falling into Recession, Depression or Secession. I’ve already fallen off a few times and climbed back up. I’m not worried about the end of the world. I’ve lived through the terrorist attacks of September 11, the Anthrax scare, Hurricanes Katrina, Rita, Irene and Sandy, a cancer diagnosis, putting my dog down, burying my dad, shady clients and other attacks on my psyche. I just wear a nice Teflon coat, learn my lessons and bounce back.
I think we all should focus less on fear and focus more on being fearless. This year when the world presumably comes to an end I plan to be in Tennessee somewhere between Nashville and Chattanooga and toasting life with shots of Jack Daniel’s. I plan to focus not on the world coming to an end but on a new year about to begin and dreams to fulfill, paths to bushwack, people to meet and a book to write.
Life is a Cliffhanger. There will always be drama as the story unfolds. And we will never know the outcome until it happens. So hang on and just weather the ride.
