Traverse City Record-Eagle

Marta Hepler Drahos

December 27, 2010

Marta Drahos: Resolutions I won't keep

----

The countdown to 2011 is just days away, and I'm making my New Year's resolutions. Not the ones I could probably stick to if I applied myself, like swallowing whole the ginormous vitamin tablets certain manufacturers insist on making, or starting my book-club books at least two days before meetings so I don't have to stay up all night the day before.

No, these are the ones I know I can't keep and therefore can't feel guilty about when I inevitably fail.

So here goes. This year I resolve to:

n Eliminate mega-bucks payouts from the lottery system. Sure, one $5 million payout can make someone filthy rich. But 100 payouts of $10,000 each could change the lives of lots of someones by providing a down payment on a house, paying for a semester of college or covering crucial medical or dental care.

n See the world, with the exception of Mexico, Spain, France, Portugal, Colombia, Venezuela, Peru, Ecuador and other countries where bullfighting is legal. I refuse to spend my tourist dollars in places where torturing animals is a national sport.

n Start a new nonprofit media organization called WikiPeeks. It would be like WikiLeaks in that it would hold federal government accountable for its actions while recognizing that making public every detail sometimes really isn't in the nation's best interests.

n Take up the violin (and the harp, and the hammered dulcimer and the piano and all the other instruments I bought with the intention of playing).

n Start a barn restoration fund that would pay to preserve the leaning, crumbling architectural remnants of America's rural past.

n Require remedial driver's training for all women in their 20s. True, that's profiling, but increasingly that's the gender and age range of drivers who tailgate, race or cut off others in traffic.

n Rid the world of reality TV shows on which cruelty is rewarded. The first to go would be "Hell's Kitchen," the object of which seems to be to cut down aspiring chefs with knife-edge verbal precision.

n Keep track of my cell phone. And my keys, and my purse, and the wristlet I bought because I can't keep track of my purse and now can't keep track of either. A local comedian thinks the latter is so funny that she's working it into her act.

n Require the rich to give away some of their millions if moral obligation alone doesn't inspire them. The late Jimi Heselden may be best known for his plunge off a cliff while riding the Segway he created, but the multi-millionaire businessman gave away more than 23 million pounds to charitable causes over his lifetime. And he was just 62.

n Derail plans for more full body-scan technology at airports. Most of us wear clothes for a reason — and it isn't for the pleasure of being virtually disrobed by any Joe behind the scanner.

n Make not a single weight-loss resolution, but try to lose weight anyway. Maybe then I wouldn't feel so anxious about the full-body scanners.

Reach staff writer Marta Hepler Drahos at mdrahos@record-eagle.com.

Text Only