What’s to Come?

In a “Peanuts” cartoon, Lucy holds her little radio up to one ear. “Listen,” she says to Charlie Brown. “Don’t you think some nice music in the morning is a good way to start the day?”

Charlie Brown answers, “I never worry about how I start the day. It’s how it ends that bothers me.”

A close friend of a world-famous orchestra conductor (Leopold Stokowski) has written that the great man often said, “Don’t ask me about what was, but what is to come!” This was typical of the maestro’s fundamental approach to life. “Shortly before he died,” the friend wrote, “he had signed a contract with Columbia Records to make four records a year until 1982 — when he would have been exactly 100.” Unfortunately, the conductor didn’t quite make it, passing away at age 95. Still, his very last recordings were made shortly before his death. With such an optimistic and forward-leaning attitude about life, it was no surprise to those who knew…