Reading Douglas Coupland

From The Gum Thief, writing as Bethany, a 20-something Staples employee:

Days like today get me thinking more about the end of the world. I look back on when I was younger, back in the 1990s, and how naive and goofy everything was back then, but it was like this happy bubble, a time snack, a little patch of bliss before the shitstorm.

There's such a difference between the world I grew up expecting and the one I got, but everyone my age has probably felt the same since the dawn of man. I didn't expect a world full of jetliners impregnating office towers, or viruses jumping species or, shit, according to Yahoo!, pigs that now glow in the dark. The modern world is devoted to vanishing species, vanishing weather and vanishing capacity for wonder. The few animals that remain here with us -- when they look at me, or when I hear them cheep or bleat or meow -- they're not animals anymore, they're the voices of the dead trying to warn us of what's coming. According to government statistics, I'm supposed to leave the world in 2062, but I can't even see 2032 in my head.

(emphasis added)

Comments

[Janet]

Waaah, aaaah. I would feel sorry for her, except the world has always looked somewhat depressing once you wake up and smell the napalm. Viruses have always jumped species (uhm, AIDS?!). The world has always been filled with people who delight in killing each other in spectacular ways. Our future is no more clouded by war, famine, pandemics and other forms of human misery than any other moment in history. In fact, I'd argue, much less so. Yeah, there are probably some difficulties ahead. (I know the real estate market is down and coastal living may change dramatically.)

But I can't think of a time in earth's history thus far that I would rather be looking ahead to. Don't get me wrong. I'm not arguing we're at the dawn of a new age of peace and personal bliss. I just don't think our track record has been great enough to nod in somber agreement with a (albeit, fictional) 20-something Staples employee whining about her future as something f'd up worse than another other 20-somethings future.

Hello. Welcome to incarnation. Enjoy your stay.