I’m writing this on New Year’s
Day, an obvious moment to think about the past year and wonder about the next. The
calendar makes it seem like an ending and a beginning, but the New Year happens
at different times around the globe, and different seasons in different
traditions. The calendar is an evolving and arbitrary social creation, yet it
offers a convenient moment to satisfy our human need to think about beginnings
and ends.
Every year has its sad
endings. My father-in-law died a few days after his Christmas Eve birthday. His
long struggle with Alzheimer’s was perhaps longer than most, because Roger
Tobin kept his athletic body going long after most people have given up. We
hoped his end was a relief to him.
My son-in-law’s father died
earlier in 2016. He was about my age, still vigorous, still working, still
strong in every way. He had much left to do, but cancers strike at much less
predictable times than Alzheimer’s, meaning they take the young and old.
In the future, those endings
will be different. Human science has cured so many afflictions and made so many
others more livable. Fighting disease is one of the most successful
international collaborations that modern society has developed. Beware of those
who would say that work is unnecessary, too expensive, too cooperative.
It seems like many cultural
heroes died last year, people of the most varied and individual talents: David
Bowie, Prince, Carrie Fisher and her mother, Debbie Reynolds, Muhammad Ali, and
Elie Wiesel. Some deaths became important news, although the lives were
virtually unknown. Black Lives Matter began in 2012, but burst into
prominence in 2016, because the ending of some ordinary black lives, such as Philando
Castile and Alton Sterling,
finally penetrated public consciousness. Perhaps that kind of ending will also
become less common in the future.
Some more metaphorical deaths
occurred. The long
political career of Hillary and Bill Clinton, stretching back to Bill’s
election as class president at Georgetown University in 1964, is over, landing
with a thud in November. The 8-year presidency of Barack Obama, which I believe
will be remembered and revered long after his numerous opponents have earned
their deserved insignificance, is over. He will accomplish much more over the
next decades.
Some are lamenting the “death
of democracy”, but that seems pessimistic to me. Not outrageous, because
apparently strong democracies have been killed in the past by people with many
resemblances to Donald Trump. But I don’t predict the death of American
democracy, because Trump is much more interested in himself than in any
authoritarian program and is not smart enough to actually lead an organized
movement.
2017 will certainly be the
start of a new political era in America, characterized by changes that are
still unpredictable. Trump will cause some, but others will come from real
social movements, born to oppose him. Those movements will define the newest
version of American democracy, ever changing, usually improving. Martin Luther King,
Jr., said, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards
justice.” I share his optimism.
A New Year’s baby symbolizes
beginnings. Babies point us all forward. My nephew’s family added a second child
in the fall, one of millions of babies whose feelings about 2016 will have
nothing to do with politics. The wisdom of children helps us get beyond the
regrets of the past, because the whole idea of regret is foreign to little
children. My nephew told us about driving his older son, not yet two, on the
day after the election. He was too bummed to notice the song that was playing
for little Jack, “If
You’re Happy and You Know It”. The singers said, “If you’re happy and you
know it, say hooray!” Jack put up his hands and shouted “Hooray!”
It’s a lesson to us all. Too
bad about 2016, but it’s over. There is much to do in 2017.
Hooray!
Steve Hochstadt
Springbrook, WI
Published in the Jacksonville
Journal-Courier, January 3, 2017
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