IT'S 2007

Saddam Hussein never saw the New Year. He went “up the long ladder and down the short rope,” as the old Irish ditty says. There is a tidy video version of Hussein’s hanging (government approved, as those tidy things tend to be) and there is an untidy video version with sound, which has created some problems for the Iraqi government. No one should be surprised. Tidiness and truth often have very little to do with each other (remember George W. Bush primly declaring victory in Iraq on the deck of that aircraft carrier?). Which brings us to Gerald Ford, who didn’t make it to 2007 either. He did enough tidying up after Richard Nixon to qualify as the tidy-bowl man. His funeral seems to go on and on, but no matter. His will always be “The Pardoner’s Tale,” and some of us will never really trust it. We will probably never know for sure how much of Nixon’s crap he agreed to shove under the rug, and some of us feel cheated. My mother didn't make it to 2007 either. She died in April and there are those in the family who want to tidy that up some too. But the truth is that my mother had an untidy life and it was her untidiness that finally made us what we are. We are part – perhaps the best part – of the mess she made. Tidying up is nothing more than trying to close the door on the untidy truth. Geopolitics, national politics, family politics. We cannot afford to let the door close and tidiness happen. The untidiness will always come back like a secret video made at the foot of the gallows. And it will have sound. Happy New Year.