I just came sweeping onto I-35 from the spanking-new 290 overpass feed and thought, again, what has become of Austin? How does it look to someone coming here for the first time and not to someone who came here 15, 20, 25 years ago? Those who are coming these days will look back in a decade and wonder where that town has gone.
It’s almost the end of the year. What a strange, rocky year it has been. A new decade begun with a startling series of ominous economic and historical honks. The past decade is now being chastised as a time of greed, moral decay, and nihilistic passion. In a way, it is argued, the events of 9/11 have re-grounded us and our culture. They have made us take a step backward from falling over the hedonist secular precipice. Ironically and tragically, they have restored a sense of order and purpose.
I don’t buy it. The past decade, more than anything, was a time of ideas, when the distance between innovation and inspiration shrank. Although a maddening time, it was also intoxicating.
You wanted to make a movie. No longer did you have to go to a studio or even hit up relatives. A small investment brought impressive equipment. Wanted to start a company. If you had a good enough premise and a strong enough plan, cash was available. Wanted to sell your group’s CDs. Again, no longer any need to trek to the industry capitals. Record and cut the CD yourself and put it out over the Internet. Freedom of expression is as easy as starting your own Web site.
None of these ventures guaranteed economic and/or public success. Opportunity required less tenacity, ideally, allowing more time for creative imagination. But ideas gained a potency they never had before. Many people in positions of power got there not because of family, clan, connections, or personal navigational skills. Rather, they got there through ideas. In a democracy, all power should be in the ideas (something to remind our attorney general).
The next few years may well prove very rocky. The last were inspirational in some fairly basic ways. If we respect those ways and learn from the excesses — the out-of-control egos, lazy politics, and the sense of economic immortality — then the Nineties will have been of great value.
The next decade should be unusual. There should be some big words about what Austin is in for here, but I have no idea. I think a lot of core issues will change dramatically over the year, as the economic impact is felt across the board. This holiday season is providing few answers as to what to expect as we head into the new year. We are a resilient people, but we may well need to be tougher than we ever have been. Welcome to the future; it is today.
Next week is our last issue of the year. The Chronicle will stick to our regular publication schedule, but our offices will be closed a lot. Next week, they will be closed Monday and Tuesday, Dec. 24 and 25, and Friday, Dec. 28. The week after, they will be closed on Monday and Tuesday, Dec. 31 and Jan. 1, and on Friday, Jan. 4. Happy Holidays. Now is the time for family, the ones we were born into, the ones that have taken us in and those we’ve helped create, no matter what their configuration. The entire staff offers our best wishes this holiday season. 
This article appears in December 21 • 2001.