I find myself in an unexpected and awkward position. You’ve heard of “glass half-full” and “glass half-empty” people. But for the longest time I was even worse than that. I was, “Aww man, who left this glass here!? Now I’ll have to wash it, and washing dishes is an ultimately pointless activity; just more minutes shaved off this short, meaningless existence on a floating rock in the center of a dark and lonely universe.”

I bathed in existential negativity before it became cool, before it was the IT thing. Now, this type of thinking is all the rage. Barbie, the plastic symbol of youth, obscene beauty, and immortality contemplates her inevitable death and decline in movie theatres all over the country this weekend.

How could this happen? And how am I once again out of lockstep with the culture by feeling optimistic?

Everyone assumes that the future is bleak. That we’ll be done in by nuclear war, or robots, or the environment or space aliens. Or a meteor will slam into the planet, sending us all flying into the black oblivion. But what if that bleakness never arrives? What if humanity drunk at the wheel somehow makes it home safely? What if we avoid a big war and the environment gets sorted out. What if the robots learn to do what they’re told and bloodthirsty space aliens never arrive?

I’ve got bad news for you, or at least news you may not want to hear: the future might be great and the present may be better than ever.

Imagine a Bright Future manifesting before our very eyes. Human history enters the greatest time period that ever was. People live longer, much longer! In fact, within the very near future we will probably see people living to the age of two hundred or even older.

As Barbie is trying her hardest to age out and disappear gracefully, medical technology is moving us in the opposite direction – towards increased longevity, to an extent previously unimaginable.

I’m sorry to say, for those of you over the age of thirty, you sadly won’t make the cut for all I’m about to describe. You missed the impending human renaissance by about one generation. But for the rest of you, prepare yourselves, because your “ripe old age” is going to be somewhere more in the vicinity of the low 210s.

We can already see evidence of the human revolution that is coming. Tom Brady played professional football well into his mid 40s, seemingly getting younger every year. And Tom Cruise is now in his 60s but could easily pass for my younger sibling.

Now is probably a good time to mention that in the future everyone will be named Tom. Just, Tom plus your last name.

Tom Smith, Tom Jones, Tom Johnson, Tom Greene, Thomas Smith-Schuster, Tomina Jackson, Tom Wong, Tomantha Allende, Tomerombombomdom.

It’ll all be Tom.

Tom, you are going to live to see your great-great-great-great-great-great grandchildren. They’ll probably have to make a new word that expresses “5 Greats” (I submit to you the term “lomfot”). You thought you were just entering adulthood, but really, you’re just a baby! You’ve got your whole life ahead of you, and all the time in the world to chase your dreams and interests.

Given my track record, I’m probably the last person who should be telling you all this. And I’m sorry for the hard news.

But I still want to stay relevant to the times and I know everybody’s really into pessimism. As they say nowadays, every cloud lacks a silver lining, so I’ll do my best to satiate you by ending on a negative note.

The future may be bright, but it’s going to be sooooo annoying! You won’t be dying quite as nearly as you thought. Instead you’ll have to wait around and be patient before you can check out of this earthy predicament you find yourself in. Meanwhile there is a heavy price tag attached to living past 200: you’re going to wear out your welcome here on planet Earth.

As an ancient Chinese proverb so eloquently stated: “Fish and company start to stink after three days.” Well, imagine three centuries.

Did you ever consider how out of touch your great-grandparents were? (if you ever met them that is) Now imagine, how hard it is going to be for your lomfot-great-great grandchildrent to be around you. That’s like spending time with lomfot Uncle Harrison from 1823, as he struts around lecturing us on the enduring qualities of quill pens. Oh, we’d never hear the end of it! Quill pens are the best, why are you using that dumb computer! Why aren’t you learning cursive!?

They’d probably never have invented the cell phone if our lomfots were around. It be forbidden as the “devil’s ringing”. After all, what’s the hurry to get about the business of life when we’ve still got a hundred and fifty years to live?

Don’t fret guys. The future is going to be wonderful, but it will still be awful. We won’t be incinerated in a nuclear holocaust, or colonized by little green men, instead apocalypse will come in the form of protracted stagnation. An entire population of ageless Barbies sitting around enjoying the infinite fruits of human progress, thinking how pointless and awful life is.

*note: if you are curious about lomfot, just google it

The Future is Barbie (lomfot*)