HAPPY DAYS ARE HERE AGAIN (1929)

The skies above are clear again
So let’s sing a song of cheer again
Happy days are here again.

— Milton Ager/Jack Yellen

Good morning. That was the campaign song for Franklin D. Roosevelt’s 1932 presidential run.

Everybody in our house sang it daily while making the beds, washing the dishes, in the shower and in the rumble seat with their boyfriends.

That song was full of hope, and in those days (exactly like these days), we needed it.

So, let’s get on with this. Did you read the Washington Post this morning? You don’t read the Washington Post? What do you start your day with? This paper?

That’s great. Did you read where I just got a tank full of gas today for $3.10 per gallon?

Here’s what the Post opened with, and don’t tell me you’re not getting excited.

“The U.S. economy BOOMED in 2023 thanks to consumers (that’s us, you, me and all your neighbors) opening up their wallets. New GDP figures (whatever that is) today show strong growth at the end of last year.”

Now, that’s something the GOP and that guy you’re crazy about didn’t tell you.

Tell me you don’t feel absolutely giddy about it.

You even feel happy that a woman, Republican Nikki Haley of South Carolina, is running down the road chasing Trump like a happy puppy chasing a squirrel, even if her numbers are a bit low.

I kind of admire Nikki. I know she has a few wacky ideas, but she knows how to get her message across.

“Bustling” is what the Post is calling it. “Bustling” — that’s what my editors call an action verb.

Phillip Carlson Szlezak, writing in the Post, just told us that “The doom and gloom that prevailed those last years” now, and get this straight, “have been swept aside.” Don’t you just love words like that?

Abha Bhattarai (I hope I’m getting these names right) who wrought the piece says “we’re shelling out on entertainment, travel and dining out.”

Now, there’s another great phrase, “shelling out,” and someone with a name like that demands respect.

Abha tells us that “bookings at the Flowertown Bed and Breakfast in Summerville, South Carolina, are up across the board, and what’s more, guests are staying overnight and having weddings and showers.”

Maybe that’s a tad flowery, even for some place called Flowerton Bed and Breakfast, but I’m excited.

Do any of you readers in central Maine remember the bad old days when you went to a Flowertown B&B or any hotel for a wedding or shower, and you had to wear a mask, and if you didn’t have one, you had to borrow one from one of the ushers, or even from the bride?

Well, all of that was in the gloomy and dark days when the skies above were gray. But now, those skies above are clear again.

So let’s sing along with Joe, “Happy Days Are Here Again.” It can’t hurt.

J.P. Devine is a Waterville writer. 

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