FEAR: Decade that just ended

The 1st decade of the 21st century should be called, "The fear of the future." It started with Y2K. We were scared because no one knew for sure what was going to happen. There were many books written about it and it was all over the news.

Sept. 11, 2001, gave us something to be fearful about, worldwide terrorism. In 2004 the Tsunami in Southeast Asia where almost a quarter million people are dead or missing.

In 2005 we had back to back hurricanes hit the Gulf of Mexico; Katrina in August, killing almost 2,000 and Rita in September which caused 11 billion in damages. The Financial crisis in 2008 was said to be the worst since the Great Depression of the 1930s. There was a Swine Flu outbreak in Mexico in 2009. It was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization. 2010 started out with a 7.0 earthquake in Haiti with a death toll of more than 200,000. This was followed by an 8.8 earthquake in Chile which set off a tsunami over the Pacific and threaten Hawaii. In 2010 the largest oil spill in the history of the petroleum industry hit the Gulf of Mexico and continued to flow for three months. Many of the residents of the area were worried that their occupations would be gone forever. Air traffic in Europe was shut down because of a volcano eruption in Iceland. Wikileaks published covert information which scares government officials. North Korea attacks a South Korean island and warns of a nuclear confrontation.

But it wasn't all bad news. The Chilean miners were brought back to the surface. We had a boom in Internet usage and HDTV. Technology took off along with science and biology. But we need to learn to use our knowledge for the improvement of mankind instead of just a few.

The 1st decade of the 21st century ended on New Years Eve 2010 with blackbirds falling out of the sky in Beebe, Ark. Some said it was a sign of the coming Apocalypse. So, we started this decade fearful of the future and we ended it the same way.

Now we have to look forward to the dreaded "End of the Mayan calendar" in December 2012.

This is when the plane of our solar system will line up directly with the plane of our Milky Way galaxy, like two pancakes crossing each other. The center of our galaxy is believed to be a black hole which distorts space-time so that nothing can escape, not even light. This is also the time of the next solar maximum when solar flares occur, knocking out electrical systems. Maybe December 2012 will be a non-event like Y2K and all the hype about it will just fade away. Maybe the people saying it will be a dud are correct. But what if they are wrong?

MAX TUGGLE

Coeur d'Alene