Good Morning Folks!
Happy New Year and farewell to the the first decade of this century. It is not difficult to remember the worry coming into this decade and the century, the Y2K hubub. Remember when everyone was worried about the computers of the world crashing. Also, there was 9/11 early in this decade and for most of it the debacle of having George HW Bush as our president. His war and greedy buddies on Wall St. took us from prosperity to the end of the decade in financial ruin, almost another great depression.
Personally, I lost relatives and friends during this ten year span, most important of which was my mother in 2006. I will forever miss her.
As a nation and culture we lost scores of cultural icons such as Walter Cronkite, Ted Kennedy, George Carlin, and many others too numerous to name. For me many of these deaths ended the era that I grew up in, especially those political and entertainment figures that represented those times for me. Their demise has changed my world, and in a way that makes me feel set adrift somehow.
The positive aspects of these last ten years exist as well. My youngest daughter got married, another granson appeared on the scene and I retired after 27 years of teaching college. I moved from Prescott, AZ to Flagstaff after retiring. In additon, I got to spend 9 of the last ten years as a Park Ranger in Grand Teton National Park. In this last year of the decade I bought a condo here in Flagstaff. So I actually own something, or at least my name is on it, the bank really owns it.
Happy New Year and farewell to the the first decade of this century. It is not difficult to remember the worry coming into this decade and the century, the Y2K hubub. Remember when everyone was worried about the computers of the world crashing. Also, there was 9/11 early in this decade and for most of it the debacle of having George HW Bush as our president. His war and greedy buddies on Wall St. took us from prosperity to the end of the decade in financial ruin, almost another great depression.
Personally, I lost relatives and friends during this ten year span, most important of which was my mother in 2006. I will forever miss her.
As a nation and culture we lost scores of cultural icons such as Walter Cronkite, Ted Kennedy, George Carlin, and many others too numerous to name. For me many of these deaths ended the era that I grew up in, especially those political and entertainment figures that represented those times for me. Their demise has changed my world, and in a way that makes me feel set adrift somehow.
The positive aspects of these last ten years exist as well. My youngest daughter got married, another granson appeared on the scene and I retired after 27 years of teaching college. I moved from Prescott, AZ to Flagstaff after retiring. In additon, I got to spend 9 of the last ten years as a Park Ranger in Grand Teton National Park. In this last year of the decade I bought a condo here in Flagstaff. So I actually own something, or at least my name is on it, the bank really owns it.
Tasha & Jason, a year after weddingAs a last artifact of the year 2009 I list my top ten films. My main criteria is that I have had to see them in a movie theater myself. One problem with that is I have missed some great films that did not make it to my location. In addition, some very good films that have already won awards for the previous year did not go into general release until January 2009. Some of these that I did not rate were The Reader, The Wrestler, Grand Torino, and Nixon/Frost. Almost all of these would have been in my top ten. So here goes. . .
1. Avatar
2. Up in the Air
3. The Hurt Locker
4. Inglorius Basterds
5. Invictus
6. Star Trek: the Beginning
7. Summer Hours (French)
8. 500 Days of Summer
9. Is Anybody There (British)
10. this is a tie between Brothers, and The Blindside
Honorable Mention goes to Michael Moore's documentary, Capitalism, A Love Story.
My movie count was down from 93 viewed last year in theaters to 62 this year.
Now it is on to a new decade and whatever adventures that brings to us all. Let us hope that President Obama can turn things around and that we get out of all of these wars.
As we use to say back in the 60s, that is 1960s (oh so long ago it seems now) . . . Peace and Love!
1 comment:
Peace and love to you too dad! I hope this decade makes us all a little happier!
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