There were a couple of angles to take with this, including thinking of just doing a RIP post on Jimmy Carter, who passed away today. But I don't know that I had much to say about Carter, since his presidency only overlapped with my life by about sixteen months. And there's only so many times you can trot out the Simpsons joke about him being "History's Greatest Monster".
Carter's passing, just a few weeks before Trump takes over again, does feel like a symbolic moment. It's hard to imagine two more diametrically opposed people. Everything I've read about Carter, even before he died, has indicated that he was deeply moral, even if not always very politically savvy; only the most QAnon-addled MAGA folks could ever suggest Trump is in any way a moral person. On the other hand, Trump has been a lot more successful politically, effectively becoming the face of the GOP for the last decade and reshaping American life even out of office.
Though I was also pleased to see that Carter was more influential, on a policy level, than most commentators give him credit for. According to a write-up in the Guardian, he started the Department of Education, the Department of Energy and FEMA, as well as providing inspectors-general for federal agencies and protections for whistleblowers. It also says he signed more domestic legislation into law than any president since WWII, other than Lyndon Johnson.
So he's earned his plaudits, and his exit from the scene just as America's worst president comes back to fuck things up again. It's notable that Trump's looking at undoing a number of signature Carter achievements, like the Department of Education. I think if I were 100 and facing that sort of attack on my legacy, I'd have had enough too.
It's funny, though, that Carter's passing isn't part of a big celebrity migration into the beyond, like 2016 was. That sense of all the celebrities dying at once felt epochal, especially when Brexit and Trump arrived - kind of like they sensed what was coming and decided to get while the getting was good.
2024 hasn't had a similar level of celebrities dying, though of course there have been many, some noted here on this blog. But it's definitely felt like a year of dysfunction just like 2016, and of economic dislocation that's bitten the Democrats on the ass.
The main difference is that, unlike 2016, we have a template for the coming four years: it'll be chaotic and ugly and stupid, and probably a lot of people are going to die that didn't need to. The question will be whether we get another pandemic, complete with botched response, or if we get to graduate to foreign policy crises, such as shooting wars in the Middle East or Asia.
But that's at the macro level - how was my year?
Eh.
In some ways it was pretty good. I felt more comfortable with the work I was doing at my job, especially after a grim 2023 in which I was overwhelmed by a new topic. I finally made a decent fist of submitting a novel to agents, even though I didn't get any interest (or not yet, anyway). And I had a couple of good trips to Australia, Italy and London, which pretty much completed my migration out of pandemic life (it took me a while to get comfortable with certain aspects of travel). I even got to upgrade to business class again, for the flight to Sydney, which I can say is the absolute best way to fly there.
On the other hand, I had trouble getting new story ideas off the ground, and the dating scene was a bit disappointing, especially compared to last year, which was one of my best years for dating. I spent a lot of time struggling with my weight, and while it seems to be going in the right direction, I've still got a ways to go.
Overall, it's also been hard to shake a fog of... something. I wasn't sure if it was depression, while a therapist I had for a while assumed it was anxiety. To which I say, por que no los dos? Of course, it wasn't major clinical depression - I was able to work and cook and get out to the gym. Actual clinical depression is no joke, and I'm glad not to have to deal with that. But it's true that a lot of things I normally like felt less compelling this year, as I hinted at in my review of all the media I consumed.
One example is the final book in Tad Williams's Last King of Osten Ard series, which I've been trying to read but haven't been gripped by the way I was with earlier books. I don't think the problem is the book, I think it's my own lack of focus and tiredness at the end of the day, when I should be happily plowing through dozens of pages per night.
Now, as I suggested earlier, it hasn't all been bad, and there are signs of promise for the early part of the year, at least. I took an online TV writing class in October and November through UCLA's continuing education program, and I'm taking the followup, 60 Minute TV Drama I, to strike while the iron is hot. If nothing else, I'm hoping to get some new insights into how to tell stories, which will improve my writing in other ways.
Beyond that, I'm looking forward to more exercise, more travel, and a clearer view on where I want to be going. I've always felt pulled in opposite directions by the big life goals (get published, get laid, get fit, get rich and get out of the house more), but I think the important thing will be to keep them all moving, at least a bit.
I did manage to get some stuff done during the first Trump presidency, after all, notably going to Japan for the first time, getting a girlfriend and pulling down a big pay bump when I switched jobs. Thinking about it, the feeling of unease has been there all year, but has felt a lot more intense since the election, so I think it's also a matter of time, and of getting over that huge disappointment.
Anyway, this is probably my last post of the year, so I'll see you all on the other side. It'll be a tough four years (and probably longer, even if Trump is term-limited), but what's keeping me going is the knowledge that things are cyclical. And while things can always get worse - truly, always - they can also get better. That progress will be measured in millimeters and fractions of an inch in 2025, but the potential is there.
Or in the words of my favorite movie this year: "Let's fucking go" and "Maximum effort"
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