Groundhog Day and the Pleasures of Uncertainty

The official origins of Groundhog Day, I’m told, lie in the ancient Celtic holiday of Imbolc, celebrating the beginning of the spring birthing season, and the Christian celebration of Candlemas, halfway between the Winter Solstice and the Spring Equinox. But for many of us, the meaning of “Groundhog Day” was never the same after the release of Bill Murray’s classic movie by that title in 1993. It has become the symbol of a banal but intolerable and insanity-producing nightmare … or maybe just the curse of getting what you wish for. 
We may fear too much uncertainty or unpredictability in our lives. But Murray’s film showed us the alternative: a world where nothing was uncertain or unpredictable, as Murray’s character found himself stuck reliving the very same events and day, over and over and over again. At one point, he even attempts suicide to escape the torture of a life that is never, ever uncertain. Which is to say, be very careful what you wish for. Because reality isn’t always as good as the fantasy.

A number of years ago, after spending a month in the colorful but chaotic cultures of Nepal and Bangledash, I transitioned through Singapore for a couple of days on my way home. It was, at first pass, the perfect detox stop on the way back to Western civilization. After a month of filthy streets, no sanitation, restrictive dress codes and a jarring lack of order, Singapore was like a tall, cool drink of gin and pineapple juice. I could drink tap water, wear a tank top and shorts, and walk safely almost anywhere I wished. All was orderly, neat, and efficient. The streets were clean, and the people were polite and well-mannered. There were rules governing what taxi cab drivers could charge. There were rules … well, actually … governing a lot of things. Where you could cross the street. Chewing gum. How and where you could express opinion and disagreement. Penalties for infractions were shockingly steep, so citizens tended to live carefully, between the lines. Imagine a city where nobody … not a single person … ever steps across a street except in a crosswalk, at the appointed time. Extremely efficient and safe. But completely lacking in soul. Singapore would never have given birth to jazz. 
It was an educational couple of days. We may rail at times against the inefficiencies of a democratically-elected and run government. But before judging the inefficiencies or messiness of  our inclusive, vocal democracy too harshly, one should spend a little time in downtown Singapore. Just for a glimpse of the alternative.
Point being, some of the things we would wish away spring from the same elements that give us the things we value most. The qualities that sometimes make our culture and governing system inefficient or messy also allow the innovation, energy, color, freedom of expression and debate, and … for lack of a better term … soul, that give our culture its vibrant personality and life. 
We don’t really want total predictability. We want balance. But here’s the other lesson of Groundhog Day. In the movie, Bill Murray’s character finally accepts that he can’t change the external circumstances of his surreal world. Balance, in that sense, is impossible. So he finds escape and salvation by working to make forward progress within himself, instead. Without drawing too many neat and overly simple comparisons, I think there still might be food for thought in that point. So, the world is uncertain, and we can’t change that. Nor, perhaps, would we even want to. But we always have control over how we react to our external circumstances. What we do with the cards we’re dealt. What opportunities we find and choose to make the most of, in any given place, time, or circumstances in which we find ourselves.