Tonight, I just wrote my 50th limerick of the year. To be honest, I don't know why I even started writing them. I am certainly not the only person who writes limericks about the news, and I am certainly not the wittiest at it, either. (You know who you are.)
But in July, I wrote a limerick about the comet NEOWISE. For some reason it just seemed like it deserved one. Then, I wondered, how long can I keep this up? And thus it began. I wasn't able to come up with them daily after the first few days, but I have still been able to post fairly consistently. Sometimes I was able to throw in references to pop culture and current events, but other times I felt lucky just to have the right number of syllables.
I tried to keep my limericks mostly apolitical. Occasionally I wrote about something somewhat related to politics (I tried to stick to news that people across the political spectrum would appreciate), but in general I tried to find topics that I thought everyone would be glad about. Our nation is divided enough without people arguing about limericks.
Come to think of it, writing these limericks was a way for me to cope with the divisions our country faces. We're used to disagreeing with each other, but this year seemed to open up a new realm of fighting, even fighting about simple reality. Never before had I felt such despair, felt such an ache about the contempt and confusion and confabulation I witnessed each day.
So I hunted for good news. I wasn't drawn to human interest stories -- I'm glad people do good, compassionate things for each other, but I wanted to find news that made headlines.
And I found it. I thought it was funny how often the good news was related to advancements in medicine or space -- we humans can make absolutely amazing things on huge or tiny scales, but we still struggle in other areas (jury's out on if there is a great stagnation or not). Many of my other "good news limericks" often featured news which was more zany than good, like a mysterious metal sculpture in southeastern Utah or several unrelated news stories in a row all about whales. But if it made me smile, I counted it as good news.
Before I began writing limericks, I often had a hard time seeing the positive in the news. As I mowed the lawn in early summer, it was like I was pacing back and forth, thinking up snappy, devastating monologues that would finally silence the naysayers once and for all. But once I began the limericks, I had to change my focus. Now I was pacing back and forth trying to make the current limerick scan properly. I mumbled phrases like "exosphere ride" and "gulf cruise plans" as I pushed my kids in the stroller. I would suddenly blurt out "stare decisis" or "waffle fries" as I folded laundry. (In fact, some of my best inspiration came during that dreaded chore.) I also spent an embarrassing amount of time on rhyming websites. Sometimes I felt immensely pleased with my limericks, but even when I didn't I was glad for the mental exercise.
True optimism is like exercise -- it takes focus and work. It means not shying away from sorrow but not drowning in it either. It means bringing your hope and joy to every situation, not to minimize others' suffering but to alleviate it. And this has been a year of so much suffering -- isolation, illness, fatigue, economic hardship, racism, anxiety, malice, division, destruction, demagoguery, despotism, and death (not to mention the killer hornets). But, thanks to these limericks, I am heartened by our collective ingenuity, creativity, and altruism. And I am convinced that we can work together to alleviate suffering.
That is why I chose to write my 50th limerick on the groundbreaking of a temple in Bengaluru, India. There is plenty of other good news to choose from, of course. But this temple provides a special kind of hope for me -- a hope that we can become closer to God, a hope that we can find strength and unity as we gather, a hope that together we can build beautiful things and alleviate suffering.
And a hope that there are many, many more good news limericks to come.
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