“Exciting changes.” It’s not just our next indie rock band’s name, it’s a phrase we hear increasingly these days. Most recently we encountered it in a press release from newspaper publisher Black Press it was shutting down, er, amalgamating the Surrey Leader with its other paper the Surrey Now.Ěý
And while the article confidently announced these “exciting changes” involve “transforming the community newspaper model in Surrey by uniting these two iconic titles under one new umbrella,” along with a new, clunky, offspring-of-a-remarried-mom type last name (The Surrey Now News Leader), let’s be real for a second. The community is losing one of its long-serving newspapers and people will lose their jobs. So “exciting” also means “terrifying,” “unsettling,” “upsetting” and/or “depressing,” if you happen to be one of those employees left outside of the “new umbrella.”
And we’re not immune to “exciting changes” either. Whether it’s our own company, our financial institution informing us it’s raising its fees, or Car2Go reducing its coverage, it’s always spun as “exciting changes.” We realize it’s both human and corporate nature to try to frame things in a positive light as we, to quote Prince, “try to get through this thing called life.” But does anyone really believe it at this point?
Then again, maybe we’re just jaded and feeling a little defeated these days as we wait for spring to rejuvenate us like the purifying waters of Lake Minnetonka. (That’s another Prince reference, in case you were wondering.) Ěý
After all, wasn’t it Charles Dickens who once wrote, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times… there were many exciting changes afoot.”
Or at the end of A Tale of Two Cities when (spoiler alert) Sidney Carton is about to be executed and says, “It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known… Honestly, I’m really looking forward to these exciting changes that are about to occur to my neck.”Ěý
And who could forget Shakespeare’s St. Crispin Day’s speech when King Henry V rallied his beleaguered troops before battle: “We few, we happy few, we band of brothers. Who’s ready for some exciting changes today?”
So chin up, everyone. It’s an exciting time we live in.
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