No one can talk clearly about the future

When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve political bonds which have connect them to another… What? In case you don’t study American history, this is a part of the first line of the American Declaration of Independence. A great document to be sure, but does it have to have all that flowery and confusing language? Yes Mr. Jefferson was doing something that was never done before, a colony declaring that it was independent from the mother country, but couldn’t he have just written something like, “Yo, George baby, that whole sending taxes across the ocean thing just isn’t happening. We’re out of here.”

In case you’re counting my whole statement was eighteen words and the partial opening sentence was twenty-two. Way too long, and it still didn’t even come close to getting to the point, while mine said everything that needed to be said. As an added benefit, I bet mine would have started just as big of a war as Jefferson’s whole document. So why did he spend months writing some barely legible document, when they could’ve sent a quick e-mail memo and spent the rest of that time gathering supplies? I’ll tell you why, because nothing dealing with the future is allowed to be clear. There is an unwritten law saying the future must be confusing. I don’t know why, but it goes way back.

The Oracle of Delphi was vague

In the Greek myths there was the Oracle of Delphi. She told one guy that he would be murdered by a man wearing one sandal. Well, that’s no help at all! Even if a person has two sandals, he’s wearing at least one. What was he supposed to do, checkout everyone’s feet who walked through the door? Should he have everyone remove their sandals at the city gates to make sure he was safe? Not a good plan. She also told Hercules that he must perform twelve labors to atone for murdering his wife. It doesn’t sound so bad until you find out how many huge monsters he was going to fight. She conveniently missed that part. Oops sorry Herc.

Nostradamus was confusing

Nostradamus was another one for predicting the future. Take this one for instance; Sooner and later you will see great changes made, dreadful horrors and vengeances. For as the Moon is thus led by its angel, the heavens draw near to the Balance. Now Nostradamus died in 1566, so sooner or later great changes were going to be made. Boy that was tough to predict, Nostro old boy. I went on line to find out what folks thought this might have meant and it seems old Nostro was predicting the plot of the original Star Wars movie, and how the death star was destroyed.

Another confusing one from my buddy Nostro is: Very near Auch, Lectoure, and Mirande, great fire will fall from the sky for three nights. A most stupendous and astonishing event will occur. Very soon afterwards, the earth will tremble. This one’s not a movie script. The three places mentioned are in France. As best as I can come up with, is a comet or shooting stars will come near Earth and soon after there will be an earthquake. Wow! How could he know that? Probably because earthquakes happen all the time and so do shooting stars and comets. The only hard part, did someone see it in France?

Is clarity all that hard?

I don’t mean to put down what you believe, but just once I’d love a prediction to be clear, concise, and direct. Something like, “In 2032, the president will be Marvin Frugelbender. He will wed Mary Smeltz in his second year of office. They will have a daughter immediately, causing the stock of Pampers to rise significantly. Three people will act on this prediction and amass great diaper fortunes, only to be in deep doodoo later for insider trading.” That’s a good prediction. It gives names, dates, and consequences. The thing is Nostro or the Delphi chick would have said something like this; After the great time of wind, in an era of trial and dust, the god-man shall wed the sunshine and produce a great light. Then the anal dirt shall become gold until justice craps on them all. It means nothing, but it’s a great prediction, or drunken babble, one of the two.

Even my friend can’t do it

I bring all this up because my friend in Seattle called the other day. She went to some community event and walked past the psychic’s tent. Some lady asked my friend if she knew someone with the initial ‘O’. Then the lady said that this ‘O’ person was about to have great troubles. My friend tossed the lady a five and went on her way. Later that night as she talked with me, we had a big laugh about it all.

The thing is now I’m getting worried. My daughter just got out of school for the summer and if great troubles are on the way it can only mean one thing. She’s going to go shopping and want expensive stuff. I thought about it, but then realized that happens every year. Great troubles might mean something worse. My son will be starting college in the fall. That will get financially hard, but will it be a great trouble? Who knows? Better ask Nostro.

And I have to figure it all out

Then again, these predictors are never specific about when stuff is going to happen. ‘About to Have’ could mean anything. Next week, next month, next year, who knows? I’m going to be looking over my shoulder for troubles for who knows how long.

Without more information, I have to ask what the troubles are? My version of trouble may be different than hers. She might be allergic to chocolate and think that I’m going to eat a Hershey bar and blow up like a balloon. I like chocolate so that isn’t a great trouble to me. Then again, if my wife announces she’s pregnant with another daughter, I’ll just go find myself a dragon and stick my head in its mouth. A new daughter would certainly be great trouble.

It’s also possible I’m worried for no reason at all. My friend is a tall brunette. There are lots of those in Seattle. What if the psychic picked the wrong one? This would mean there is another ‘O’ initialed dude who has no clue that he’s in for great troubles. Of course, if she wasn’t psychic enough to pick out the right person to make the prediction to, she might need to go back to psychic school for a refresher course. Even I can predict that.

Before it’s too late

So, if she’s going to do nothing but give me confusing predictions, I’ll have to worry every time my friend calls. I’ll be scanning the Caller ID with the eyes of a hawk. This will be a real problem because of where my Caller ID sits. It’s behind some stuff, and will have to get moved and relocated to a different place, just so I can see the display I don’t really care about. That’s going to be a lot of trouble!

Hey, wait a minute! That was predicted!