In the 2008 film The Hurt Locker, Jeremy Renner plays a Staff Sergeant who defuses explosives in the Iraq combat theatre. One day, he stumbles upon an IED so powerful that even with all his protective gear, it would have shredded him into meat confetti if it went off. After assessing the situation, he decides to remove the protective gear altogether. When his commanding NCO demands to know why, he shrugs and says that if he had to die, he’d at least prefer to be comfortable.
He simply couldn’t lie to himself about the facts. If he botched the defusal, he’d die. No amount of unicorn piss would change that. So, he chose to be real about it — and play the hand as it was dealt.
Fast forward to 2024. Out here in the open-air asylum we call reality, we are bombarded with bad news from every direction — and somehow still manage to look shocked every single time. But the truth is most of it has been visible on the horizon for years, even decades. We just preferred squinting into the sun and calling it “uncertainty.”
We refused to address the 2008 financial implosion — and every other fiscal mess before or after. Instead, we printed mountains of pixie-dust money to paper over the holes. That money wasn’t backed by anything real. Just belief. Faith. Imaginary collateral. And for a while, the illusion held up.
Now we act stunned as inflation chews through our savings like termites through balsa wood. As if we didn’t know spending money we don’t have would eventually land a bill. Well — the bill’s here. And it’s going to keep arriving for years. There is no such thing as a free lunch, and we’re all about to find out what’s on the menu.
We refused to impose real consequences on Russia for twenty years while it dismantled its neighbors and called it diplomacy. Now we’re aghast that Putin has gone full warlord in Ukraine — as if his polite masks weren’t slipping off since the early 2000s.
We embarked on a green energy fantasy tour and now pretend to be shocked when our energy bills triple and basic goods become rare collectibles. We tore down functioning, economic systems and tried to replace them with technology that can’t survive five minutes without intravenous subsidies — courtesy of the taxpayer. It was never going to end any other way than with a shivering populace and an economy buckling under its own forced virtue.
We rolled over for every fringe ideological whim disguised as moral progress. We treated our own cultures as disposable while elevating every imported grievance to sacred status. We refused to call nonsense what it was when it first crawled out of its academic Petri dish — and now we act surprised when zealots think they can dictate how the rest of us live, think, speak, and breathe.
When you avert your eyes from real problems, they don’t vanish — they metastasize. Sure, they might slip out of sight for a while, and we may lull ourselves into believing that silence equals resolution. But under the surface, they grow. They are not wine. Time does not improve them.
Reality is a brutal place. And a hard truth — especially one about yourself — is more than most people are willing to entertain. Those who choose to live with their eyes open are rare. They always have been. And they always will be.
So then — what now? How do we face down this mess?
Vote for a different troupe of grifters? I wouldn’t hold my breath. Fix things ourselves? Track record says no. Shake the silent majority into action? You might as well try herding cats with a flute. At best, you get micro-scale revolts. A school board here. A mayoral upset there. And even those often end in impotence.
In other words: we’re not fixing it. They won’t fix it. And “the people” won’t wake up. We are a statistical rounding error with eyes open — and that’s not going to change.
I was born in 1969 — the year humanity walked on the Moon, connected ARPANET, launched the Concorde, and watched Monty Python take its first irreverent breath. The year of UNIX, the ATM, the Jumbo Jet, and Woodstock. It was a year soaked in innovation, rebellion, and the giddy illusion that the future was ours for the taking.
Of course, I was a toddler at the time, more interested in formula than UNIX. But still — 1969 stamped my generation: Gen X, the post-Boomer nomads. We’re few in number and often forgotten, but we were the last kids raised in an unconnected, analog world. Call us untainted, if you’re feeling generous.
We played in the dirt. We climbed trees and bled from real wounds. Video games didn’t show up until later, and even then, they were pixelated junk compared to the adventures we had outside. We roamed freely, met our friends at playgrounds, rode our bikes into the void, swam in rivers, and learned how the world worked by touching it.
We straddle two realities — the tangible and the virtual. We know both, but we trust only one.
Why bring all this up?
Because I’m 55 now. Old enough to see patterns. Young enough to still do something about it. And considering the last five years have been a blender set to “liquefy,” I think we’re going to need every bit of that old-world wisdom just to keep from going over the edge ourselves.
And that’s the crux, isn’t it? The only thing left worth steering is our own lives. The macro-scale madness? That’s out of our hands. Sorry if that kills the vibe. But the world doesn’t run on hope and hashtags.
Maybe you were hoping for a roadmap out of this — some neat path to salvation. There’s no shortage of smooth-talking saviors online eager to sell you one. Easy fixes, angry rants, cathartic fantasies. And sure, it feels good to hear someone say it’s all going to be fine. But if you’re reading my blog, chances are you’re not here for fairy tales. You’ve got your own scars. You know the game.
No guru, no rally, no doomer video montage is going to change the reality you’re in. Only you can do that. Only you can prepare for what’s already unfolding.
If you live in Europe, as I do, brace yourself for thirty rough years. Maybe more. Yes, I’ll be 85 by the time things might improve — and that’s assuming best-case scenarios. Odds are, most of us will live out the rest of our fully sentient lives in this particular version of decline.
There’s no shortcut, no hack, no reboot button. The silent masses and their elite managers will block any hard reset until collapse is no longer a prediction but a lived experience. Only when everything is broken beyond repair will action seem acceptable.
Yes, there will be places in the world that hold up better — pockets of light. But where there’s light, there’s shadow, too. You might escape to one of them, if you’re lucky, mobile, or rich. But most won’t. Most will stay. And for those of us staying: prepare for a life that doesn’t resemble what we imagined during the golden years of Netflix and economic numbness.
Knowing all that — might as well have some fun, right?
How, you ask? How does one have fun while the world collapses like a flan in a cupboard? How does a prisoner sentenced to life enjoy anything? How does someone with terminal cancer still laugh?
Simple. Because being miserable won’t change your circumstances — it’ll just sour the hours you do have left. Reality won’t shift just because you’re sulking. So find the good bits, however small, and hold onto them like heirlooms in a burning house.
If dirt-poor people living in the margins can find joy, what’s our excuse?
Look at the future and weep — or stare it down and smirk. Treat it as doom, or treat it as the ultimate obstacle course. Either way, it’s coming. You might as well enjoy the run.
A person who sees clearly, accepts the mess, and still manages to laugh — that person can’t be broken. That person is sovereign.
At the end of Shōgun, Lord Toranaga says he doesn’t shape the wind. He studies it — and rides it. No matter the direction.
He had fun, too.
Welcome to my world.