EDITORIALS

Be careful out there

Opening day of two thousand and fourteen

ALL RIGHT, everybody, quiet down. April, will you pass out the papers? Thank you. For those of you who want it-for those of you who want it!-there are donuts and coffee over there. You two back there, June and July, siddown. We’re ready to get started. May, will you shut the door? Thank you. Now, let’s settle down so we can get down to business. We’re going to have to hit the ground running and all that. I said, we’re going to have to hit the ground-

Will everybody just be quiet a minute!

Thank you.

This one’s not going to be easy. These missions never are. I’ve sent a lot of you out into the world, and sometimes what happens ain’t pretty.

June and July, siddown! What are you two doing, besides not paying attention? You know, it was exactly this kind of thing, in this very room-everybody playing around and goofing off-when 2001 started.

Do I have your attention now?

(Silence.)

I don’t mean to get all mad at you. You’ll encounter enough anger without my adding to it. But you people really need to pay attention, this being your last briefing before you, well, you know.

Things are bad out there. Not as bad as some years I’ve seen, mind you, but bad enough. Terrorists haven’t given up on terror. Kidnappers haven’t given up on kidnapping. Drug lords haven’t given up on drugs.

You’ll all see death. Get used to it. Every month of every year sees death. I haven’t seen an empty obituary page yet. Not even for one day of one week of one of you months. It’ll get you down if you don’t keep your head, and perspective. Remember, there’ll be plenty of new life, too, so focus on that.

Fires, floods, earthquakes. Sure, they’ll happen. They always do. It’s your duty to keep the damage to a minimum, if at all possible. Other surprises, surprises not connected to the weather, will happen, too. In every month of every year. Some of them are less than pleasant, to say the least. Keep plugging away, though. Remember your training. Always remember that no matter how bad things may seem, things can always get worse. And that eventually even the worst things pass.

Some tips from an old-timer: Do your best to avoid Reality television-it’s a waste of time-and focus more on improving mankind. Don’t get caught up in the daily media-storm and its obsession with scandals, real and imagined. They’re usually not new; they just have a different cast of characters from year to year. Sex, money, cover-ups, over-vaulting ambition, you know, the usual. All as old as sin. Yet a terrorist can emerge from prison as a saint, and save his country. A scandalous rogue can spend the rest of his life doing good works and earn a knighthood. Do the names Mandela and Profumo mean anything to you pretty little things yet unmarred by experience? So never, never, never give up hope.

But don’t dare let your guard down, either. Above all, don’t forget your lectures about the Middle East. Or Europe. Or South America, Africa, Asia, Canada, France, Liechtenstein . . . and everywhere else. You never know where trouble will surface. A dozen years ago, which of you could have picked out Afghanistan on a map?

I don’t need to remind you that together you all are, steel yourselves, an election year in the United States of Sensational Accusations. It could get muddy. Take your galoshes.

I’ll take questions at the end, February. Hold them for now.

WHAT’S SO interesting out the window, January? Oh, I see. Yeah, the months of 2013 are just getting back.

Good Lord, look at them. Geezer that I am, I haven’t seen such a collection since I saw a squad of GIs come sloggin’ back from the siege of Bastogne. But don’t give up hope. They didn’t.

Yes, months, take a good hard look at your predecessors. And the condition they’re in. They’ve been through the fire and, for the most part, did all right. Most of those wounds will heal. Most. You should have seen it when the early ’40s came back. Not a pretty sight.

I hope I’m not depressing you kids.That’s not my intention. Each of you will also see weddings and births and sports and fun and games. And miracles, if you’ll just notice them. Not to mention a good book or six, and maybe even a movie worth seeing. There’ll be fireworks-the good kind, at holidays-for a couple of you. I hear there are plans for some great weather-in all seasons. There always is. Headquarters is good about that.

The best thing about surprises in your profession is that some of them are actually good. There’s been news in the papers about a new 3-D printer that could, sometime in the next 12 yous, produce a human organ. Goodness, how that would change the world.

Great things will happen. They always do. Every year.

It’s just that, well, I want you to be careful out there. I need another 2001 like I need another 1914. Come to think, we’ll be celebrating-no, commemorating-its 100th anniversary this year. Let it be a warning.

So let’s get started.

January, you may go ahead and leave. You’re already a few hours old. The rest of you, pay attention to your operations plan. It could take a hit if you don’t keep an eye out for-

Editorial, Pages 16 on 01/01/2014

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