Sentenced to history
It is a feature of existence, often noted in the circles within which I move, that history repeats itself — the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce. This may not be an immutable law, but it sure resembles the way the cookie so often crumbles.
History has a way of plodding ever onward, despite any number of New Year's resolutions to the contrary. Time and tide, as they say, wait for no-one.
Indeed, it would be true to say that we are all sentenced to history. The dead hand of all past generations rests like a nightmare on the mind of the living and, despite themselves, each generation must make what it can of the accoutrements bequeathed to them by the past: a dash of ideology here, five parts tradition, two parts circumstance, and voilà! — welcome to today!
I don't know about you, but this can make for one helluva day-to-day. No-one asked me to join the wheel of fortune — I was told — and I don't see very many prizes on offer from the wheel.
So, being the kind of guy I am, I thought I'd challenge my route through history to see if I could alter it somewhat. Bend it a bit more my way.
The way I read it, my personal plan to challenge history required me to reconstruct myself. To change history I needed first to change myself.
But this change is a very different process from deconstruction. I wasn't so much going inward by peeling off layer upon layer of muck, but outward — reaching out to merge with history in order to fall in with its line of march. My impetus wasn't simply to interpret it, but to change it — and by striving to change it, understand it.
I am pleased to announce that now history and I are getting along famously. We've had such times together, history and I.
Of course, I'm no celebrity, nor am I likely to become one. While history is forever promising fame and fortune, I doubt if I'll warrant a footnote. This is something one learns to accept. Those who seek to change history don't get good press.
Still, we persevere, working at the coalface, digging at the foundations like a burrowing creature. That's what we evolutionists are all about.
By Dave Riley