AWAITING A MIRACLE

The good thing about life is that it does not stand still. Good and bad things, joy and trouble come and go. One cannot feel good or bad permanently. Otherwise, living would be dull and insipid. Why are we opening our New Year story with these lines? I just want to avoid critical comments that "there is a crisis outdoors with rising prices and you are telling us what we should put on to usher in the New Year". R+ has never given that kind of advice but it has always called to look upon the New Year as a time to wait for a miracle. That is to look upon it through the eyes of our children. We will do it again and again today. All of us have children and their very existence is a reason to rejoice. It is so because we grew up at very difficult times. The times of our parents were even harder. Despite this, they did not fail to throw a little party and bring a fairytale as a gift for the kids. It is also because there is no ideal world and therefore we must exist in this one and take it the way it is. And live on. 

The Giver of ideal things

But what if we fancy that an ideal world does exist? Lois Lowry, a US children's writer, did a good job fancying this in her book The Giver published in 1993. In the light of the latest events, The Giver is an incre-dibly important book for us because it is a dystopia, a warning novel set in some not so very distant future. 

Like many adult dystopias, the book scares you not with monstrous scenes of violence but the very make-up of the society depicted in it that may look ideal in terms of our concepts. In that society, all philistine hopes have come true and all fears are gone. Do you want not to worry about your future? Okay, your own life is under cradle-to-grave control. Do you fear people unlike you? Okay, get a sameness in which even all colours have merged into one grey. Do you want to feel no hunger? Get birth control and a rigid distribution system: marry somebody assigned for you, bring up children born for you, study a profession selected for you and, having lived to an old age, go to live in a "group home" from which you will be quietly "released". All these things put together are very frightful. It is especially horrible because the book shows this "wonderful world" consisting of identical communities through the eyes of a child who knows no other world and believes the world he knows is the only possible and right one. 

At age 12, children receive their career assignment, and the central character, Jonas, is appointed Recei-ver of Memory. It turns out that the community has a person who keeps memories and remembers the real world. There is a reason why the perfectly organized dull society needs to keep all those memories. Meanwhile he (the Giver) is already old. Jonas will have to learn from the keeper that there are colours and pain in the world, snow and the sun, family and the New Year, oceans and deserts, famine and wars; and to understand that what he habitually takes as his own and beautiful, is in fact ugly and cruel. 

The Giver is definitely a book that can be called extreme. It presents the other side of social security, safety and protection as a doubtless and very trivial evil. Still, even if The Giver is an extreme, Lois gives us the clear idea that even an ideal world is imperfect. Maybe overcoming the difficulties of life with its good and evil, its highs and lows is just what makes us learn our lessons and draw our conclusions, what helps us gain spirituality and come closer to God.

Take life easy

We must go our own way and it seems that life, which does not stand still, will make us better and, after some slight hardships, a fortunate period will always follow. It cannot be otherwise. This routine will go in step with the Monkey and in tune with its mood. After all, the Red Fire Monkey is the symbol of the coming year 2016. This animal is known as joyful and cheery, never losing heart, taking interest in everything, solving intricate problems quickly and making friends easily. This infers that we are going to live a jolly year, with people thinking less about long-term future and be happy with every day and every minute of life. As a mater of fact, this is prescribed by many major religions of the world including Christianity and Islam. At the same time, people will learn to understand one another; they will be able to forgive old hurts and therefore they will be able to regain and strengthen relations with their dear ones. 

By the way, astrologists advise that we should not give in to temporary hardships because 2016 is going to bring luck in business and high profits to business people, traders and bankers who dare stake their all because the motto of the Monkey Year is "Nothing venture nothing gain". The coming year will be marked with flourishing science and rapid technical progress. This is why 2016 is a very favourable period for implementing bold, innovative ideas. Broad-minded people with versatile abilities may count on fast career progress. 

If you manage to apply your    talents aptly, you may not only provide for yourself but also become famous in the Monkey Year. The year 2016 will bring drastic changes in personal life to many but those changes will be for the better, in most cases. 

The 2016 horoscope promises us a great variety of surprises and changes to happen in all spheres of life simultaneously. In order not to be confused amid all those changes and keep afloat, one will need to learn to see a good aspect in any situation and promptly take advantage of favourable circumstances. All this is part of our world, so wonderful in its imperfection. 

We should learn to live in the present and we should try to prolong the fairytale for our children. Every-thing on the Earth goes ahead getting ready for next stage and so do we. Let us be happy in the New Year!