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a decade ends

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

Tokyo, 2009.12.23

A decade ends in eight days. I've seen a fair bit of fuss about it in the media, all of a sudden.

People complain about what a bad time this nameless decade was. Time called it The Decade From Hell. Other people complain that there wasn't even a really big music album for everyone to agree that was good.

Fie, I say. Fie. This was a tough time in certain respects, it's true. Everyone seemed to have a hunkered-down, unhappy mentality for a lot of the time. And it's true, the news was mostly not good. But we've only got one life to lead, and I certainly didn't wait around for things to get better. So while everyone else is griping and looking back at a lost time, I'd like to report on the good stuff that happened to me this decade.

rand()m quote

Work is about a daily search for meaning as well as daily bread; for recognition as well as cash; for astonishment rather than torpor; in short for a sort of life, rather than a monday-to-friday sort of dying.

— Studs Terkel