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Rick Magee (opinion): I’m sick of the apocalypse.
It’s the end of the year and the beginning of my sixth year of writing this column, so it feels like it’s time for a year-end wrap-up. But a year like 2022 is perhaps easier said than done and will forever stand out in my memory as… The past 6-7 years have always been “holding up beer” years, and with every new date added to the calendar it seems like there’s been a race for the worst date ever, but 2022 The years were like staying there. This is not to say that there weren’t any major events, or moments of joy or fright, but it never lived up to expectations.
Many of my students graduated from high school at the beginning of the pandemic, so they missed graduation and prom. Then, when they entered college, they faced more social distancing, online classes, and a special situation that was loud and unsettling. I put a finger quote on it.
When Russia invaded Ukraine last spring, one of my students with family in Poland left the classroom in tears, worried about what would happen to them. The rest of the class had ghostly faces. As a GenXer who lived through a time when everyone thought they would die in a nuclear Armageddon before graduating from high school, I sympathized with them. Was this the beginning of the end of the world? If so, it’s been a very slow start and we’ve grown tired of Apocalypse.
Last month’s midterm elections continued that theme. I was outraged and sick of clearing my email inbox of campaign notifications to raise money to help stop the end of the world as we know it. It gave many of us an existential whip for posting a link to an article that screamed and shortly after posted other links that screamed about the illusion of red waves.
When the turmoil subsided, it was, in fact, a historic moment when the incumbent party did not suffer heavy losses in the midterm elections. The same thing happened in 1934 and 2002, both as a result of the Great Depression and the United States facing the Great Depression of 9/11. So why did this year feel like a wet firecracker?
The best symbol of 2022’s lackluster plotline may have happened last week. The former president teased the world with his next big announcement, showing a penchant for caps rock and exclamation points. When I learned that the big announcement would be the release of a digital trading card featuring artwork like the one drawn by his sixth grader who jumped on Mountain Dew and Skittles, I’m sure this wasn’t the case. Wasted at least an hour to do some monumental hoaxes. did i miss something? Was April Fool’s Day December Fool’s Day?
no hoax. This is where we are now. Expect the end of the world and get a Pokemon imitation that no one asked for.
I think the answer to this Jean Brady, the middle child in our turbulent times, is that we’re looking for meaning in the wrong places. We expect sane resolutions, but forget that they usually only arrive when you’re in the shower and replaying what happened. History is written only in novels.
Rick Magee lives in Bethel and is a Professor of English at the University of Connecticut. Please contact him at rmmagee.writer@gmail.com.
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