Episode 10: The Day of Terrible Peril

Hello all!

Happy Wednesday, it's my birthday, so I'll start with the new birthday song I made up.

Happy, happy birthday,
Another year to thrive
And so we'll stay
Far away
To help you to survive!

Oh, and it's also:

National That-Sucks Day!

Which, let me tell you, is an interesting to discover about your birthday. This should be a day of celebration, right? I mean, yeah, it's Tax Day in the USA (well...normally...) but that doesn't mean things are that bad, right? Right?

Oh...right...

Thing is, my birthday has long been overshadowed by tragic events--both before and after my birth. Think the burning of Notre Dame was an isolated incident? Try (and thank you, Wikipedia, for most of these):

2014: The Chibok schoolgirls get kidnapped on the night of April 14-15.
Also 2014: The worst massacre in the South Sudanese Civil War.
2013: The Boston Marathon bombing.

And those are just the things that happened in my lifetime! (Thankfully, April 15 decided to not-suck as much until I was almost out of college.)

Go back in history and we have:
1912: The sinking of the Titanic (the hit occurred late the night before, but it's generally agreed that most of the deaths happened on the 15th)
1865: Abaham Lincoln dies.

Heck, it was April 15th in 1955 when the first McDonalds opened. Let me tell you, I don't consider the creation of fast food to be a pinnacle of human achievement. I even share a birthday with Kim Il-sung (died in '94), mass murderer and Supreme Leader of North Korea.

Oddly enough, my due date was 04/20, the birthday of Hitler, so I guess I was destined for a mass-murderer connection regardless.

So, where does that leave me?

Well, I can either complain, or live with it; and I choose the latter. After all, Leonardo Da Vinci was born on April 15th (one of the few people I consider a personal hero), apparently Insulin became widely available in 1922, and some of the happiest moments of my life have happened on April 15th.

At the end of the day (and there are still 13 more hours to go) life will move on, just like it always does. And, really, in our current hour that's the best that can ever be hoped for. We live in an uncertain time--what's going to happen next?--where it seems as though terrible things are happening every day. But they've always been doing that--it's part of life, I'd argue--which leaves you, dear reader, with a choice: are you going to complain about it, or are you going to live with it? I've made my choice, what's yours?

This has been another Adventure in the Austentatious. If you liked it, tell your friends; if you hated it, tell your enemies; and if you don't care either way, then tell everybody! Stay safe, be amazing...

And happy Quarantine!