My prophecies for 2022
When people think the world might end, their first move is to Google for confirmation.
I discovered a couple years ago that putting “prophecies” in a headline delivers online hits throughout the year. It trends more reliably than “Squid Game cookie recipe” and has the staying power of “Britney Spears.”
Of course, that year was 2020. When people think the world might end, their first move is apparently to Google for confirmation. The news didn’t make most year-in-review lists in ’20 or ’21, but we’re still pirouetting around the sun.
Still, a promise of prophecies may have led you to read this in hopes of gleaning inside knowledge about whether it is safe to buy the green bananas, or for tips to feed your new sports-betting habit (which probably will lead to the world’s end).
Sorry to disappoint. I have no insider knowledge, even though my in-box is packed with forecasts from oracles, trending experts, fortune-tellers, futurists and sadly optimistic Mets fans. Their very persistence is evidence of one certainty in life: People always forget.
No one remembers January predictions 12 months later. I long ago patented the phrase “rosecolored rear-view mirror,” to describe human nature’s reliable tendency to believe the past is better than the present (“remember COVID, when we got to work from home? Sigh, those were the days”).
While traveling to North Carolina for the holidays, a light bulb went off over my head that revealed the future. Spheres of light the size of beach balls hung from trees throughout the Charlotte area. They were especially popular in the ritziest neighborhoods, like the one with the colossal Trump insignia and houses that imitated Downton Abbey. So, coming next holiday season to New Canaan, Darien, etc., will be light globes. Stock up now.
Here are a few more non-sports certainties you can drop coin on:
If you can’t leave the house, put wheels on it: Winnebagos were everywhere during our 800-mile drive. So were dirt lots being transformed into RV lots. People want to see the USA; they just don’t want to get there in large flying tubes coated with the cooties.
Fido comes first: People have been bonding with their dogs during the past 22 months of isolation, so more hotels and motels will accommodate pets.
2022 Person of the Year: I was pleasantly surprised to see so many masks worn in Southern stores that didn’t mandate them. I also saw fear in eyes above the masks, probably because they’re babies about getting needled. The Unvaccinated should have been Time magazine’s 2021 People of the Year (who else had greater influence?). I have no doubt they will continue to drag us down in 2022.
Actors with Connecticut roots will appear in nostalgic throwbacks: No crystal ball is more reliable than television, even if the screens are no longer curved.
Any time I watched TV during the holidays, I played an internal game (“One Degree of Connection”) linking shows to the Nutmeg state.
Click ... “Being the Ricardos.” Vivian Vance, aka “Ethel” on “I Love Lucy” lived on Old Long Ridge Road in Stamford. And Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz eloped to the Byram River Beagle Club in Greenwich (where their television doppelgangers would also exchange vows).
Click ... “And Just Like That.” The “Sex and the City” reboot includes the brief return of “Mr. Big,” played by Chris Noth. Noth, who is under fire for multiple claims of sexual assault, once detailed his wayward boyhood in Stamford. Referring to his younger self as a “hood” in a 1980s Stamford Advocate article, Noth recalled getting kicked out of three of the city’s schools. “I was a real trouble-maker,” he confessed.
Click ... “The Matrix Resurrections.” The return of “Neo” is a reminder that the first (and still best by far) film in the series included longtime Wilton resident Joe Pantoliano as “Cypher” (aka, the guy who said, “Why, oh why, didn’t I take the BLUE pill?”).
So if you want to plan your viewing habits for 2022, you might start by researching Connecticut actors. What could be more fitting than Christopher (“Doc Brown”) Lloyd (who grew up in New Canaan’s famed Waveny House) going “Back to the Future”?
A reboot of “The Office”: Fans have been pondering for 21 months how Michael, Angela, Jim & Co. would manage in a virtual business world. Now try to imagine them getting orders to return to their Scranton branch (“I have natural immunity!” Dwight insists). For that matter, they could revisit Dunder Mifflin’s Stamford branch (where we once delivered copies of the Stamford Advocate for set design). The reality version won’t be any less dysfunctional. Connecticut has failed for generations to find a way to clear rushhour traffic. The pandemic offered a solution, along with environmental benefits. But, again, people ... always ... forget.
I could be wrong about everything (save for the certainty that some readers will reliably tell me just that). But if I stand by one prophecy, it’s that holiday light globes will fill Connecticut trees next December.
It’s the only guarantee of things looking up in another 12 months.