the Mind’s Chew Toy

Is it just me, or does it seem that Christmas decorations are appearing in stores earlier and earlier every year? It seems that just yesterday the stores waited for the day after Thanksgiving before bringing out their stock of Christmas decorations. But this year, I begin to see Christmas decorations pre-Halloween!

Just look to cars if you want an indication of where this may eventually lead. 2007 cars are mostly out in dealerships by August of 2006. How is that possible? If it’s a 2007, shouldn’t that mean the car is first available in 2007? Since we just purchased a new Nissan Versa, we now can say that we own a 2007 model (that is not available in a 2006 model) in November of 2006. Does that sound peculiar to anyone else?

But who’s to blame for this rushing? You got it - you and me, the consumers. We, the American people, are in a rush to get the newest (which now means best to most of us) stuff we can get our hands on - yet at the same time love remembering our past, whether it be through collecting, or through our rather frequent trips down memory lane.

So why are we either rushing forward, or remembering? Why don’t most of us live in the now? I can sum that up pretty quickly - we don’t like today. With most of us working jobs we barely care about in a society that’s always at war with someone, today isn’t such a happy place for most of us.

When we remember the past, we do so with blinders on, so even the simplest little thing that happened can be expanded to us sighing and saying “Ah, the good old days”.

The future, despite having not yet lived up to most expectations (who else remembers we were supposed to be in flying cars by the year 2000?), still holds the hope of something better, a bright new vision that’s just over the horizon.

To deal with the unhappiness of today, many of us turn to prescription medications - “happy pills” like Prozac are all the rage. But do we really want to go through life artificially happy? I know, some people need those medications in order to survive, but our quick-fix society has hooked many of us on taking the shortest route - and happy pills are easily the shortest route to happiness. But are they the best for all of us? Definitely not. Unless you have an actual chemical imbalance, these pills are just the easy way out.

So, what should you take away from all this rambling? Try to enjoy today. Stop living in the past, or living for tomorrow, and try to live a bit more in the now.

Try enjoying today. And if you don’t? Well, then you can always go back to listening to your retro-80’s radio station, playing some Trivial Pursuit, watching The History Channel, and dream about the High-Def Plasma TV you’re going to get some day.