The Decade Past; The Decade Ahead

The talk of the end of a decade didn’t really strike me until a FaceBook friend’s wall post set the following challenge:

Take ten minutes: think back and describe to yourself in detail exactly where you were, physically and mentally, ten years ago today, 31st Dec 1999.

Now THAT puts things in perspective. Perhaps because of the pre-millennium hype, my memories of that day are unusually vivid. And where I was, “physically and mentally”, could not be further removed from where I am today. What a long way we have all come.

On 31 December 1999, lest we forget, the fate of life as we knew it hung in the balance, and there was a tangible excitement. Not only was there the fin-de-siecle ambience of those heady days, but of course the Y2K bug was threatening to wipe out all digital records (including, I was hoping, my erstwhile credit card debt). I was living in South Africa, the only country I had ever seen, temporarily back with my mother after my first adult ventures into communal living didn’t work out, and trying to make ends meet as a media monitor. Working in media, I was one of the first to see the striking headline of Johannesburg’s The Star newspaper: it was a photograph of the Earth from space with the headline “The Last Day”. This was a rare expression of that unique and fleeting zeitgeist from a time when local mass media was still the greater voice of the people – a phenomenon that, a decade later, is a relic of a past era.

I remember taking a deep slice out of my left thumb while meticulously chopping carrot matchsticks, and baking brownies black with cocoa to disguise the secret ingredient. My millennial statement was shaving my head and having my nose pierced, in sheer defiance of the horror this caused among the more conservative folks. A very early start to the party – sunset; bantering conflicts about the aforementioned brownies; the Afro wig someone had brought along and the many uses it was somehow put to; my vague sense of guilt at not starting the new millennium in a more sensible fashion; the old friends who always seemed to be around.

Every one of the key people at that New Year’s bash has gone light years in the past decade. One went on to study in Ireland and later became a lecturer at a prominent South African university. One furthered his studies while working, rose to a high professional level and immigrated to Australia. Another made and lost millions, and is now on the way up following his off-beat creative passions. Yet another reached the pinnacle of his profession in classical music before his life was tragically cut short in a motorcycle accident. Yes, we are all in very different places now.

And then there is me. Not very far into the new millennium (which it turned out did not involve the end of the world) I got my first computer, took my shaky first steps in using the Web, used it to find work in Taiwan, worked there for five years, took a long trip through Southeast Asia, wrote a book about my travels, narrowly escaped matrimony, learned how to live a healthy life and deal with people, spent four years in Oman, furthered my studies with a UK university, and did all the little things that connect those dots. I could hardly be further from where I was a decade ago. Where then, will I be a decade from now?

This is not entirely in my hands, naturally. But I do believe that our actions can set the course, whichever way the wind blows. My actions are, first and foremost, to put in place what is needed for quality of life: positive routines, healthy habits, constructive action. Secondly, to make the most of the opportunities that come my way, which right now involve my work and studies. The third is to keep dreaming. Dreams are what drive us forward. Dreams are what I would like to see taking shape in the coming decade.

My wish for my family, friends, social networks, both online and off, and their extended networks, spanning all humanity, is that we will make the most of all we have in the coming decade, because that is where growth will come from.

A blessed 2010 and fresh new decade.