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Friday, January 1, 2010

¿Happy New Year?


Warmest Best Wishes for a Happy New Year

At the end of 2007 all who knew me wished me a Happy 2008. As we remember that year was bloody awful in general terms, but for those of us who retained our good health and our economic status, more or less, we can probably admit that we were happy-ish during 2008. As a general comment on that year my final blog was entitled “Goodbye 2008 and Good riddance.”

Then came 2009 and the worldwide misery grew by a quantum leap. We wished family, friends and co-workers a Happy New Year while crossing our fingers. Now, the question is put: did you have a happy-ish 2009?

Spain is absolutely drenched in economic woes. The unemployment rate stands at a staggering near 20% of all adults of working age. Schools continue to graduate students into the workplace where there are no jobs awaiting them. Just when these young people are panting to get started to experience their independence they have nowhere to go. They are all dressed up and everything is shut.

In the United States there are more than sixteen million jobless people, many of whom are seeing their unemployment benefits cease. The loss of homes, cars, private education, and health care benefits are commonplace. There is not much happiness in that scenario. We would have to dig real deep to find anything that we could say qualifies as a happy-ish event. For those families that are still intact, that is something very important to be happy and thankful about. For children whose education has not been interrupted through having been taken out of private school, that is something else for joy.

Losing a family member to death will usually be cause for sadness, even when the event is perfectly normal as in the case of the elderly. However, putting that natural part of the life cycle to one side everybody will have their own take on what the year has meant. Happiness, which most of us have difficulty in defining, needs to be re-defined, and possibly downgraded. We are living through one of the most trying times in the history of the world.

Looking back over 2009 it certainly had its ups and downs. However, for my family and myself, we think that this year has treated us fairly well. We didn’t win the lottery, but we have our health and strength. Our son has been away in Australia finding his own independence, and for the first Christmas we have been apart. My wife and I have discovered each other all over again and we feel more in love than ever. So, in spite of 2009 being the year when the sky fell on the earth we can say that your wishes to us for a Happy 2009 were realised.

It’s time once again to look forward to the New Year, all 365 days of it. For you we firstly wish that you all will have good health. That’s Number One. Following that we hope that 2010 will deliver a steady stream of good news and rising expectations throughout each and every day.

Happy New Year!

Copyright © 2010 Eugene Carmichael