Word: new
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...that encourages us to believe that progress is a good in itself, and by a global power, the world's youngest, that is more interested in where it's going than in where it's been. His Alliance for Progress, Bill Clinton wrote recently in an editorial for the New York Times, is pledged to "elevate hope over fear and tomorrow over yesterday." Rousing words, but who's to say that tomorrow is better than yesterday, those in Sri Lanka or Peru might say, and why should we put hope (based on what might happen) over fear (based on what...
...anchor), we find ourselves, more than ever, doing the splits, with one foot racing toward the future and the other firmly rooted in the past. "Fast" cultures fret over Y2K, and slower ones, some even with their own calendar (in Nepal or Ethiopia, say) hardly acknowledge that a new millennium is coming at all. The jangledness of inhabiting several time frames at once is the hallmark of our jet-lagged age. The clappers bang together on the sidewalk in Toronto, but they mark a clock without a face...
People who consider themselves sophisticated tend to disparage the making of New Year's resolutions. ("My resolution is not to make resolutions" is surely the most irritating rejoinder since the deeply annoying "Let's not and say we did.") But it's easy to see why the snobs wince. Yes, New Year's resolutions are glib, sanctimonious and self-serving. Yes, they are the haiku of holiday kitsch. But isn't glib, sanctimonious, self-serving kitsch the glue that holds us together as Americans...
This year many of my closest personal friends, people who would ordinarily have no trouble tossing off a dozen or so resolutions, are having great difficulty. Why? Obviously it's the onerous burden of Y2K. As we all sit on the precipice of the new millennium, our legs dangling in the glorious future, the pledges that seemed sufficient in previous years--"I need to get on the StairMaster more" or "I'll be more patient with my kids"--just don't seem to pack enough vision and gravitas. But we must all fight this false sense of obligation to make...
...Surprisingly, celebrities are the consummate resolution makers. Asked a simple yes or no question (e.g., Will you be watching this year's Super Bowl on television?) your typical actor/singer/model will prattle on interminably about the Bhagavad-Gita, string theory and film restoration. But ask a celeb for a New Year's resolution and out comes a pithy, succinctly worded and cogent personal mission statement...