HEY! Welcome to 2021!
No, no, no…..not 2020-won….2021. If you’re reading this, you kicked 2020’s ass. So, 2020 did not win…dammit.
Granted….it was a different kind of year. We survived it though.
I gotta admit….in some ways 2020 was kind of cool. I did a couple things last year that I thought I’d never be able to do. Like what? Well….just as an example, I rushed into to quick stop gas station two minutes before they closed wearing a mask and carrying a pistol in my belt. I kinda felt a little bit like Jesse James for a minute. BUT….Regardless of my intentions, had I tried that in 2019, I’d have been tasered, arrested, convicted, and I’d still be eating prison food. In 2020, though….it was perfectly acceptable.
Ya know all the misinformation, the schools moving to an online format, the restaurants closing, mask wearing, the travel regulations, the riots and protests….none of that stuff really had much of an effect on me. It was a little inconvenient at times, but I’ve lived a lot through worse…..I’m sure most of us have.
What really got to me was the whole election cycle last year. Don’t groan….I’m not going to bitch about who won what race or who has power in which office or chamber. They’re all criminals in some form or fashion….I’ve moved way beyond getting my britches in a bunch over blatant and exorbitant corruption….er…ummm…I mean, politics.
What caught my attention about the elections….from the debates, through the primaries to the general election…..was that most of us weren’t voting FOR someone. If you think about it, most of the people you talked to were voting AGAINST something or someone.
I don’t know if everyone experienced it the same as I did, but when I’d talk to someone about any stage of the election process, they were more apt to tell me why they weren’t voting for a particular candidate than to tell me why they were voting for the other. We were all seemingly laser-focused on the negatives.
When you think about it though….that’s the bulk of the information we were being given. Honestly, it was about the only data we had in order to form our opinions and decisions. From the debate stages and rallies to the commercials and media coverage all we were getting from the candidates and their campaign teams was negative shit about their opponent, or the opposing party in general. It was all sleight of hand kind of stuff….if you’re looking at how jacked up I say they are, you won’t be focused on what a dirt-bag I am.
That really got me to thinking about the path we’re on. Actually, more like the path we’re being led down. Negativity…It’s everywhere. Hell, it’s in hamburger commercials. Saying “This is our new burger” isn’t good enough anymore…it has to be followed up with “the other guy’s burgers suck”. You rarely see a car commercial where they don’t take a shot at the competition. Pick your favorite national news venue….print, radio or cable…..keep track of the amount of positive stories you hear in comparison to all the negative shit you hear. It’s astounding.
There has been a metric ton of research done on negative reinforcement in reference to raising kids and working well with other adults. Over the last three decades we’ve drastically changed the way we raise children and conduct ourselves in the workplace. We have been trained to rely on the carrot and refrain from the stick. We’ve been taught that a positive home life produces happier and healthier children. We’ve been taught that a positive work environment increases productivity.
In our homes and in our offices we’re expected to promote a positive attitude and an environment that fosters personal or professional growth. Why do we accept different from our society as a whole? Why is it okay for politicians, the media and big business to spend thousands of hours and billions of dollars to try to keep us pissed off?
Pissed off. Has anyone noticed that there’s plenty of that to go around anymore? Every time I venture out into the world it seems like I’m running into more and more unhappy people. I’d bet if you asked them, they couldn’t even tell you precisely why the hell they’re disgruntled. Sure, they could spout off the latest lines of bullshit that flowed from their television, but what exactly does that have to do with them personally? Nothing….99 times out of a hundred, the things that are pissing us off have little to do with us…..but we’ve been bombarded with negative vibes all day and night and it just feels right to be upset about “things”.
Then the domino effect kicks in. Let’s just say…I just spent 20 minutes in the floor wrestling with a puppy, then got in a truck that I love to drive and took a ride down a twisty road in the Appalachian countryside to go get coffee filters. I’m in a damn good mood…I mean…what more could someone ask for? But…after dealing with the drivers with road rage on the 15 minute trip to the store and then being surrounded by pissed off people for a half hour as I’m trying to figure out where the hell Walmart moved the coffee filters, I end up in a foul mood. Their pissedoffedness rubs off on me and frustrates me. My frustration leaks out into the universe and infects those around me….and so on….and so forth. Unlike COVID, there’s no mask to curtail the spread of negative vibes.
Before you go to Google and check….“Pissedoffedness”….yeah, I made that up….but you understood it….and if you understand what I’m saying, it’s effective communication, isn’t it?
Ya know…I remember when my kids were young….Christmas Spirit was magical. That spirit seemed to start somewhere around the week before Thanksgiving and it would last through most of January. Did anyone notice how quickly all that “Peace on Earth and Good Will Toward Men” stuff faded this year? It was overnight. By December 26th this year half the nation was in a pissy mood again.
**SIGH**
So….I’ve run around the stump a few times getting to where I’m going tonight. For that I’ll apologize. I’ll try to bring this to a quick close. Once again….Bill will help me get my point across…..
Ya’ll know the story….three ghosts come and show you all the negative shit in your world and you have a life-altering epiphany….the Christmas Spirit fills you and you decide to become a better person.
If we can choose to let the Christmas Spirit infect us for a couple days, why can’t we choose to do that every day? I think we’ve got enough bullshit going on around us that we probably don’t need the three ghosts right now. Why not let the negativity fall on deaf ears and concentrate on doing what’s right for our fellow man? Wouldn’t that be nice?
I’ll let you in on a little secret….but only if you promise to spread it around liberally. That Spirit….that desire to do right by others….the need to help others up and pat people on the back…the will to go out of your way to make someone smile or laugh…..all those positive vibes….they’re just as infectious as all that negative. We can pollute the world with smiles if we want to. It’s going to take all of us to overcome the amount of negativity out there, but it can be done.
All we have to do is treat everyone we come in contact with like we’re bumping into them on Christmas Eve.