Diary entry

LITTLE ROCK — DECEMBER 23rd. The day before the day before Christmas. Despite all the things she had to do, or maybe because of them, the lady’s mind wandered. Christmas is coming, the goose is getting fat, please to put a penny in the old man’s hat.She knew the days were getting longer, but who could tell under the blue gray clouds that covered Fayetteville? The middle aged spinster had just risen from her afternoon nap and switched on the antique radio to get the party line from National Platitudinous Radio.

But what was this? No news, just the theme from Swan Lake. Maybe it was because she was still a little sleep dazed, but the music had a vaguely ominous sound to it. Like some sort of grim joke. She thought of the last scene of Dr. Strangelove with its musical overlay of “We’ll Meet Again” as the Americans and Soviets detonate their nuclear bombs in the world’s last danse macabre. She glanced at the clock. 4 p.m. Yes, time for a quick recap of the day’s vanity-of-vanities followed by All Things Distorted. The well modulated voices of its cast hadn’t changed; every rounded vowel delivered the show’s familiar subtext: We’re Better Than Most People but Try Not to Show It. Everything was the same, all was self-satisfied with the world. Why had she been concerned? If you haven’t got a penny, a ha’ penny will do/ If you haven’t got a ha’ penny, then God bless you.

But why Swan Lake? Had they dropped the Bomb? Did the theme from Swan Lake kick in automatically when The End was near? She thought of checking out the news from her iPhone. Or maybe just looking at everybody’s end-of-the-world messages on Facebook. Hadn’t the wingnuts been hinting that some sort of revolution was imminent? Had the tea-party crowd marched on Washington and stormed the offices of NPR, brandishing their pitchforks at Robert Siegel even as he commented in bemused tones on the quaintness of their striped overalls? Or maybe they’d moved on to Boston Harbor to do a sequel to their original show in, when was it, 1773? Those colonials are still a rambunctious bunch, and scarcely civil to their betters.

Then she remembered that KUAF had moved to a new building earlier in the week. The station was probably just having trouble receiving the program from NPR. Oh, well. The pause was welcome. She switched off the radio. The music had changed to “The Dance of the Sugarplum Fairy” or some seasonal such. Must be a Tchaikovsky medley, she thought. Not bad, but she preferred silence, the sweetest music.

She was one of those increasingly rare Americans who preferred her own company, at least when she wasn’t on her laptop. She made herself a nice cup of tea and settled on the sofa with a nineteenth century novel, now assured without having to check that today, once again, the Almighty had chosen to save his finest creation, mankind, from itself.