I think I read the news when I was in fifth grade, or in middle school, more, because back then I didn't fully understand the gravity of what I was reading, or what the big picture was. The news helped me form my conception of that big picture...and then, once I had it, somewhere in high school, or college, I stopped wanting to read because I got disgusted with the politicians (that's when I stopped reading A-section of the Post, and also the Metro section, thank you DC...), afraid of what would happen to the financial markets (good-bye business section,), and then that just left me with Food, Travel, Style (and the comics!!!) and even some of those were weekly, and then I stopped reading altogether, and stopped knowing what was going on. And then every time I picked up the news, I didn't want to read more because it just made me terrified of what was going on in the world and that everything seemed to be pointing to everything - foreign policy, our economy, the world's economy, countries and their civil wars, etc -  going to pieces.

But more and more, I don't think that that's the attitude that I should have. Because I think everyone wants the world to be a better place (at least, a better place as they've conceived it), and there's no way to do that without being informed. And being uninformed and uninterested is an easy, quiet way to contribute to the continuing deterioration of our civil society as we know it. Maybe because I'm riding the collective wave of disgust that anyone with half an inkling of what's going on in American politics today has for Congress and their ineffectiveness to do anything except for bicker, or maybe because I want this country to succeed still, just so me and my children and their children's children can live without fear of their economy collapsing or their rights being infringed upon, or maybe because those bitches up there have slowly and methodically been picking away at places I want to work or support at in the future with their proposed/implemented funding cuts to the DOT and Amtrak.

So over the course of this year, I am going to make sure that I will read, and read, and read, and read, and read, and submerse myself in knowing the world and things that happen in it, because that is an obligation that I have to fulfill for myself and what I want the future to be like.