One day, we'll look back and laugh

At least that's what I hope.

I'm trying not to be too nostalgic about this--I mean, isn't nostalgia for Baby Boomers?--but here, things are coming full circle, and it's hard not to smile, even chuckle at the things we claimed in the past or believed in the past, or shunned in the past.

When I was in high school, I thought "Eww, Fresh Air?!? What kind of new-age gobbledygook is Fresh Air?! It's probably some Joseph-Campbell-new-age-hero's-welcome mumbo jumbo!" Then seeping through the jazz station in San Diego, I heard Bill Russell and Ellen DeGeneres, more recently it was rappers and Bill O'Reilly. Hey! This stuff is cool! I had to eat my words. Fresh Air wasn't just Zen and the Art of Soft Voices. It was like, the best interviewer I had ever heard. She also wears bitchin' hornrim glasses.

Nearing the end of 1983, all in a flutter that we were about to reach 1984, and was George Orwell right?, my well-informed-always-best-of-intentions brother told me I had to read 1984 before December 31st. He claimed the book would spontaneously combust once we got to 1984. Or disappear. Or be illegal. Something like that.

That was the most ridiculous thing I'd ever heard and I decreed it couldn't possibly be true...but just to hedge my bets, I went and checked with my better informed father first. Unfortunate for me, my dear sweet brother was lurking in the hallway. Thus, no credit for sticking to my convictions. Damn.

It's hard to stick to your convictions, especially when the information is constantly changing.
Is this the office of Misinformation or the Thought Police? I'm sorry, no! I didn't think that. You only think I thought that!

But smile I did, waiting for my lunch of teriyaki chicken today, and remembering my pedantic musician friend in Tucson, who tried to tell me that if I wanted to learn good debate skills, I should watch Crossfire. As if just by virtue of having 2 people of differing viewpoints speak, we have a meaningful debate of issues where we each person respects the other's right to make their point, and change their mind, and have values that don't make them immoral or amoral or amorphous or immaterial.

Crossfire, ha! Debate ha!

We watched Crossfire in class today. And not just any Crossfire. Crossfire with JON STEWART.

What a beautiful man. Either the "smartest funny man" or the "funniest smart man" they say. And you know what he said?!?! He said 1984! He said 1984 is still good! And important!

Okay. I may have made a teeny bit of that up. Doesn't change the fact that I have to read 1984 for tomorrow, and take that, my brother!! The book is still here!

I just KNEW it.