Illuminati return says something is coming

Lou Marzeles
News Editor

     I've written before about Goldendale's "Illimunati," more than a little kiddingly. The idea of a group in the area preternaturally enlightened has a certain appeal, and my earlier mention of it was to use it as a metaphor for good things happening and poised to happen in this area. And just this morning, I dropped in again at the local Illuminati secret meeting place, an esoteric establishment up on Simcoe marked by golden arches. Looking for all the world like normal people, members of the group were talking of seemingly innocuous things, such as the weather and what so-and-so was doing lately, but it was fun to imagine them secretly encoding their casual conversation with underlying hidden significance.
     What I enjoy about that playful metaphor is that it reveals this: all apparently casual conversation, particularly in a small town, does carry underlying significance. It's certainly not always of a nature that provides clues to timeless verities, but it always means something other than just what's on the surface. And if I look at the kinds of conversations going on in this community of late, I detect a clear and unmistakable undercurrent. A lot of conversations I get into around town are with people who think that when they're talking with me, they're talking with a newspaper-often, in my capacity, that's quite true. But even then, conversation commonly runs to the same underlying theme, despite the wide range of specific points that can come up.
     So what is that theme? It's about an inexorable change coming to this community, a good one, one that reflects the remarkable qualities of the area and its people. Even among those for whom change is good only when it comes out of a vending machine, there is a sense that what's coming is going to benefit the area.
     So is this just me, reading the signs all too positively? A couple of people in town have taken me to task about that tendency in me (I really must remember to do something about it). But I think the truth is that good people know good things when they're coming.