Happy New Year

Is it just me?  Or is that traditional New Year baby showing signs of apprehension and exhaustion, even before he's born?

It's hard to get ourselves excited about 2013.  The Democrats and Republicans have converted governing into a private grudge match, ignoring the real problems facing the country.  Analysts warn us that political wrangling will be only worse in the year to come, even if a temporary patch to the financial "cliff" is somehow patched together this week.  The re-election of Obama didn't persuade the Republicans that they had drifted out of touch with the nation's majority.  It just made them madder.  "Mad" in all its definitions.

Politics aside, everything just seems to be getting worse.   Hurricanes and other storms, attributable to global climate change.  Crazy mass killers in Connecticut and Colorado, as well as nonsensical killings on a lesser scale all around the country.  A nation arming itself to the teeth.  Mass unemployment.  Rampant drug use, especially in rural areas and small towns. 

The dying year, 2012, did have its good moments, the November election being one of them.  On a more personal level, my two great nieces had their second and third birthdays, showing already those tendencies toward rich talent and amazing genius that so typify my family.  I had two highly enjoyable trips overseas: to England with a 14-year-old relative, and to Morocco with my adult nephew.   I plunged into the Grand Canyon, hiking down to the river and back, all in one day -- something I'd been wanting to do for years.  

In times of stress, such personal enjoyments can tide one over until things get better.  Families during the Great Depression often found happiness in private lives that were loving, if austere.  We may be learning to follow their footsteps during our own Great Recession.  But I worry about the temptation to focus solely on private pleasures and ignore the infighting of doctrinaire politicians who seem increasingly beyond our control.

The greatest political events passed over the heads of the people like black or golden clouds.  Later it was to watch even the ruin of the Empire and the coming of the barbarians with indifference.   It was a worn-out body whose fibres no longer reacted to any stimulus.

--Ferdinand Lot, The End of the Ancient World and the Beginnings of the Middle Ages.

I once included that quotation in a commentary on the Watergate crisis, concluding that, as bad as things seemed at the time, "the fibers of our civilization remain healthy."

Today, I'm not so sure. 

But, tonight, whatever our optimism or pessimism, 2012 comes to an end, and 2013 finds himself born -- willy-nilly.  Let's all hold our breaths, vow that we'll attempt to make our civilization better and stronger, and welcome the poor, naked little tyke into the scary world that awaits him.

Happy New Year!