Post-Flu Euphoria

Ah yes. The sun is shining through a misty spring morning here at Terra Nova. The birds are singing; the puppies, sleeping. And I finally seem to be coming out of an 8-day flu-related funk. I won't go into the details, but suffice it to say, I've been fairly sick and pitiful. Today, aside from the usual lingering cough, fatigue and slight fuzziness in the head, I am feeling close to human again. It reminds me of that scene in Shogun when Anjin-san was committing seppuku for some noble reason I can't remember, and at the last instant, as he was already thrusting the knife toward his body, the local daimyo, which is to say the region's military ruler, grabbed his wrist and stopped the blade, and Anjin-san, rushing back from the certainty of death to the raw sweetness of life, sat silent for a moment so that all you could hear was rain falling outside, and then he said, very softly, "The rain is fine, isn't it?"

It is good to feel alive again. What's more, even the morning's New York Times seemed full of good news. First, San Diego's own Fat Man Walking completed his waist-shrinking, soul-searching cross-country hike yesterday by walking right into Manhattan. Along the way he's dropped a hundred pounds and found his bliss, plus a book deal and folk celebrity status. You know, more power to him. He took on a crazy goal and he actually did the thing. That's just inspiring.

Second piece of good news for the day, W's poll numbers have reached record lows, and third, the population of Russia is dropping by 700,000 per year. To some, I realize, especially certain individuals in Washington and Moscow, these latter two headlines would read as bad news. But I see them as hopeful signs that one) the American public is at last regaining its sanity and two) it's actually possible to reduce the planet's burgeoning population without war, pestilence or famine.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, obviously a vodka-glass-half-empty kind of guy, has expressed his alarm about the spectre of economic and military contraction. In fact, he's turned into a procreation cheerleader, talking up the wonders of love, marriage and family, and even offering cash bonuses for each baby produced.

But from the global perspective, more is not always merrier. Sometimes seating fewer guests at the table means everybody gets to eat. As it is, we lose 30,000 kids a day to starvation and malnutrition. Yes, 30,000. So that's why I say, it's a good-news day all-around. Also time for a little more cough syrup.