Coprolite Newsletter, August 2005

I'm not at all thrilled with the way this decade has been going, and I think it's time to start a new one.

Now, you might think you can only start a new decade in years divisible by ten. Actually, that hasn't been true for about half a century.

Anyone old enough to remember the period we call the Fifties ("Happy Days," rock 'n roll, and all that) knows that it actually happened from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s.

It was 1954 when disk jockey Alan Freed first played something he called "rock 'n roll" on radio station W.I.N.S. That was the year "Shake, Rattle, and Roll" and "Rock Around the Clock" first hit the charts and Elvis made his first commercial recording. People younger than me wouldn't believe the kind of sappy, old-fashioned music we listened to in the early Fifties.

What do you picture when you think of the Sixties? Chances are it's flower children, long hair, and demonstrations. Those Sixties actually took place from the mid-1960s to the mid-1970s.

The civil rights bill of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 kicked the civil rights movement into high gear. President Johnson began sending troops to Vietnam in 1965. Between civil rights and the war, a lot of anti-establishment fervor swept the country. The Beatles (who first came to our attention in 1964) added long hair to the mix.

Do you see what's going on?

In the same way, the silly Seventies happened from about 1975 to 1985. Pet Rocks appeared in 1975, which was also the year bell bottoms attained their greatest cuff width. Charlies' Angels arrived in 1976. John Travolta didn't catch Saturday Night Fever until 1977.

Then the greedy Eighties blossomed from about 1985 to 1995. Michael Douglas declaimed "Greed is good" in the movie Wall Street in 1987. It was 1989 when Leona Helmsley revealed that "We don't pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes." That was also the year when all us little taxpayers had to bail out the Savings and Loan industry to the tune of $175 billion.

It follows, then, that the Nineties really began about 1995. It's been a scary time. Oh, it's true that the Cold War had ended and the Soviet Union broken apart just before then. But instead of having to worry about a superpower enemy (hopefully controlled by somewhat reasonable leaders), we are plagued with freelance enemies and assorted crazies who feel no restraints at all. It's the decade of school shooters, the Oklahoma City bombers, the Unabomber, and Al Qaeda.

I devoutly hope this decade will follow precedent and come to an end some time in 2005.

There was a time when decades kept to their proper margins. For example, the Roaring Twenties (Prohibition, flappers, and Elliot Ness) happened pretty much during the years they were named for. The Thirties were dominated by the Great Depression.

Where we got off kilter was in the Forties. I guess it was because World War II was such an overwhelming experience that when it ended in 1945 the world was a completely different place. We turned our thoughts from war to rebuilding, hope, and prosperity. We started a new decade without realizing it.

We don't have a name for that decade from 1945 to 1955. We can't call it the Forties (which brings images of World War II) and we can't call it the Fifties ("Happy Days" and all that). Let me know if you come up with a name. Anyway, ever since then, the decades have been off by five years.

That's why the Nineties are finally due to end this year. It's time. Let's call an end to the awful tribal warfare in the Balkans, Africa, and Congress. No more terrorists, talk radio, or reality TV. We need a change.

One problem might be choosing a name for this new decade. Nobody has quite figured out what to call the years since 2000. Do we say the "Twenty-Os," the "2Ks," the "Twenty Hundreds," or the "Two thousands?" They all sound pretty confusing. Or maybe we could just call them the "Zeroes" or the "Nothings." That doesn't sound terribly positive and hopeful.

I suggest we just start early on the "Tens," a name that implies perfection. Yeah, we could use at least fifteen years of "Perfect Tens" before we start on the next set of Roaring Twenties.

––Wayne Adams
wayne@coprolites.com
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