FTER A YEAR
Ain the desperate darkness of the COVID tunnel, a light is finally visible in the near distance (hopefully it’s sunlight and not an oncoming train). As tantalizing as the prospect of returning to our old lives is, it would, I think, make the suffering and loss of so many, meaningless, if we did not recognize the opportunity we’ve been given to re-examine ourselves as a nation and as human beings and come together to redress the important social, economic and political ills we’re suffering from.
My birthday is in June, two-and-ahalf I’ve got enough clothes and clutter. But months away. Plenty of time for the world could do with a few things. those in power to do some shopping. Thank you, President Biden for giving And before you say, “My, she’s a greedy us the first item on my wish list by girl” – the gifts on my wishlist are all putting the environment at the top altruistic. I’m getting to the age where of your to-do list. One of his first acts my personal needs and wants are few. as president was signing an executive order for the U.S. to rejoin the Paris Climate Agreement. Another executive order laid out a bold plan to prioritize climate action, both nationally and globally and move away from fossil fuels. General Motors added their own early gift by pledging to manufacture only zero-emission vehicles by 2035.
Donald Trump’s gold-plating is finally revealed to be iron pyrite, and like fool’s gold he’s suddenly worthless, not only financially but politically. He was indicted on tax and insurance fraud, sexual assault, inciting the Capitol riots — to name just a few. He’s taken from the sumptuously kitsch Mar-a-Lago to a big house in a different gated community, one with razor wire, iron bars and orange jumpsuits.
QAnon to QAnon-Entity. The theory becomes the Vanilla Ice of the conspiraverse with all former fans scratching their heads and asking themselves, “What was I thinking?” I just noticed that ‘conspiracy’ contains the word ‘piracy.’ How appropriate as like a pirate, QAnon raids peoples’ heads and hijacks their brains.
Ted Cruz, Lauren Boebert, Tommy Tuberville, John Cornyn, Josh Hawley, Mitch McConnell, Lindsay Graham et al. decide they need to spend more time with their families and resign from Congress. Madison Cawthorn resigns because he realizes that being a congressman is not just a way to promote his brand, he is actually expected to read and understand legislation. And Marjorie Taylor Greene resigns in order to be sent into outer-space (back home for her) to destroy the Jewish forestfire-igniting lasers.
A luminous pink bubble sucks up every member of the Proud Boys, American Guard, Oath Keepers, the American Freedom Party and all other hate groups, then returns them to earth filled with a love for all man- and womankind and they become tireless, non-violent advocates for equality and tolerance.
Police departments around the country do some serious house cleaning, sweeping out the bad apples and instituting policies of zero tolerance for cops who use excessive force. As long as there are no serious repercussions, like felony convictions and jail time, the police will continue to attract trigger-happy thugs looking for a legimate outlet for their violent, and often racist, natures.
All countries are given equal access to the COVID vaccines. Rollouts are major successes around the world and the vaccines prove effective against the British, South African and the Brazilian variants, or what I affectionately call the milk tea, biltong, and samba strains. By my birthday we emerge from our cocoon-like existences and have something to truly celebrate.
With the help of Greed Anonymous, billionaires like Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Zhong Shanshan, Mukesh Ambani, Bernard Arnault, Françoise Bettencourt-Meyers get over their addiction to having money, money and more money, and start giving it away, and not just through charitable donations, but by a radical redistribution of their wealth. The richest people in the world have a combined net worth of $9.1 trillion. If they gave away twothirds of that amount it would enrich each of the 736 million people living below the poverty line by $8152, and they’d all still have more money than they could spend in multiple lifetimes.
And lastly, Regé-Jean Page is tapped to be the next James Bond. For the half dozen of you out there who haven’t yet watched “Bridgerton,” Page plays Simon, Duke of Hastings. The producers of the creaking bastion of white masculinity that is the Bond franchise could learn something from the colorblind casting of the successful Netflix series. Bond is fictional so there’s no reason he has to be white. The same goes for the bad guys. Of the 33 main villains in the 25 Bond films, only fiveand-a-half are non-European and only two are women. On second thought, maybe they got the villains right. White men are more likely to destroy the planet.
Honestly, we have as much chance of getting most of these gifts as we have of getting a magnetic floating bed ($1.2 million) or a star named after us, but it can’t hurt to put the energy out into the universe.