plural legacies
something (such as property or money) that is received from someone who has died
- She left us a legacy of a million dollars.
- a substantial legacy
For the record, legacy has nothing to do with legs.
That’s a shame.
A real shame.
Nice, shapely ones would likely do very well in this.
Legacy, however, has become a bad word. It’s a word that people throw around a little too much as it is a powerful word of memories.
Something or someone has legacy when people remember them down the road.
Like Shakespeare, for example. That dude has legacy.
How many 15th Century English playwrights can you name off the top of your head?
Trick question as Shakespeare was 17th Century, and I’m betting most of us don’t know or care.
Of course we can name many historical writers, but unless one studies them it is hard to put a timeline to them. For me, until we get to Mary Shelley, Bram Stoker, and Arthur Conan Doyle in the 19th Century, I cannot give dates on anyone other than Shakespeare.
Let’s take Stephen King as an example. The man is a great, prolific writer, but I feel safe saying very few, if any, will remember Cujo or Firestarter in 500. That is not a slag on Stephen, either. He is one of the inspirations for my fictional style, so I would never slag him…except, perhaps, his endings. But then again, who doesn’t do that?
Another example, off the top of your head and without cheating, how many of you can name the number one chart topping hit song of 1981?
It was this one:
I was going to say 1982 originally, but then decided that Olivia Newton John’s “Physical” does actually have *ahem* legs and became a memorable song. This one, however, is one most under 50 have likely never heard as anything more than department store music, and most over 50 would have difficulty remembering if it was the late 70s or early 80s it came out.
Give it another twenty years, and it will quite possibly be forgotten except on rare internet searchers stumbling onto it.
So enough about writers, musicians and artists. How about politicians? Business people? Architects?
Recall any from the 17th Century? I mean, who could forget William Hatcher? The man who…ah…well, he was a politician. Okay, how about John Atwood? He must be related to Margaret Atwood, no? Maybe he is, maybe he isn’t. How the fuck would I know?
Yes, we do have history buffs and some experts that would remember different writers and such thanks to studying them, but I’m talking as a collective.
Shakespeare is an exception. Others would be Cleopatra, George Washington, or Ghengis Khan.
Whether deserved or not, these people are characters of history that most of us know who have become romanticized legends. No doubt that half (or more) of what we think of as fact is fiction.
On the other hand, we tend to remember fictional characters more as a group anyway. The likes of Sherlock Holmes, James Bond, Dracula, Jesus, King Arthur, Uncle Sam and Betty Crocker were written down somewhere and are likely seen as just as real, if not more so, than the historical figures above.
On the fiction list, there are many that think the last four were real…and some of those would believe that William Shakespeare didn’t exist.
But today, in this modern society (alleged), we keep hearing legacy thrown down at lower classes by those above who want to be remembered for something, yet we cannot remember much of what came before. People on high who claim to be superior human beings to the rest and expect the lower classes to agree and bow in subservience.
The word has become a bully.
The one thing this modern group of egomaniacs has going is the digital age remembers everything…
…for now. When the technology changes, not everything gets moved over.
Seriously, go looking for Paul Janz’s Renegade Romantic to stream. It never made the transition from compact disc for some reason and was a much more enjoyable album than his follow up, Trust. I highly recommend “Saddle Up”, by the way. Great tune for the over the top crowd and should be played at every Dallas Cowboy games as the team runs out of the tunnel…even when just practicing.
Sorry, I digress. Where was I?
Oh yes.
Yet all these politicians speak of the legacy that we need to leave.
Wrong word.
Legacy suggests we are doing something to make it a better planet.
Reality is, we are now trying to clean up the mess that is likely to be left for future generations.
That’s not legacy. That’s caretaking.
Legacy would be if we put a new human settlement on Mars…that didn’t involve us abandoning Earth due to the environmental catastrophe left behind.
Remember…catastrophe is an award for the cat with the best backside.
Think about that later. You’ll laugh.
Then you’ll forget as that joke as it was recycled and has no real legacy.
