The Year in a List

One could have missed the previous 365 days and, with the help of year-end lists, be caught up on all the hip-happening things and events of the year in less than an hour.

Starting about a week ago the listings of every conceivable thing that is measurable, calculable and computable were popping up.  There were the ten top movies (broken further into categories of the preeminent adult themed movies, family movies, action movies and chick flicks), TV shows (American Idol, Survivor, All About Raymond), books (the paramount directory for fiction, nonfiction, cookbooks and self-help – meticulous in its itemization by age class),  Broadway shows (drama, comedy and other) and music (boxed sets, soft jazz, rock and roll, easy listening, and types I honestly know nothing about) and web-sites (E-Bay, Yahoo and Google and a host of others that call out to the cyber-minded).  Tallies of the ten highest paid actors; the highest grossing films and ten secret hideaways of the rich and famous were being duly deliberated.  The top ten restaurants – by region, the best culinary delights and food fads of the year along with the eminent cocktails of the past months were laid out for all to salivate over.  Extraordinaire vintages, chocolates and ten unsurpassed places to raise your glass to see the perfect full moon were analyzed and presented to the uninformed.  Chronicles of the ten best toys for boys and girls, registers of the premier luxury sedans, sports cars and sumptuousness SUVs permeated for the “big” boys and girls and the ten best places to take a scenic drive with your vehicle were gifted to all.  The finest establishments to pamper your pooch, fancy salons and spas to keep their owners also occupied and satisfied and a record of what the most chic of us would be wearing were presented in the most reachable of ways.  There are also lists that contain the ten worst of things; pretty much this is a compilation of the opposites of the best lists and can be more educational and enlightening if you read them correctly and abide by someone else’s learned mistakes.

The lists go on and on, much to my chagrin.  I am frustrated that I have lived the full year and failed to notice more than a third of the entries on any of these lists.  Embarrassed by my dwindling level of coolness and fear that the “it” I felt I had so much in abundance is diminishing at a speed I cannot control.  The comfort of staying home and being uninformed is paying its price.  If the “they” who control such things would make these lists accessible at the beginning of the year I might have a fighting chance to set goals, actively search out the pros and cons of selected entries and achieve success (as measured by another list).

Or, maybe I am still in the cool zone and this is actually a well-executed plan of conspiracy to challenge the psyche and ward off memory lapse.  Somewhere, in a room, is a group of 40- 50- and 60- aged something’s who have plotted this devious dare of top ten lists to actually stimulate one’s mind and conversation when otherwise dullness and boredom would intercede.  Discussion of the timely topics of the year would help me sound on top of things, educated and in tune with current events… I like it – I think I will adopt this positive mindset.  Maybe I will start my own top ten lists this next year – that could actually be fun, considering all the people, places and things I encounter and it would be cheaper than therapy.

Cynthia A. McClelland, curious observer of the obvious with interpretations of the oddities of daily life. Mother, wife and lover of the furry, resides in the north Lake Tahoe area.

Cynthia A. McClelland © 2003-