I am writing this on February 29 - Leap Day.

     Leap Day is an admission that we are not perfect. Or maybe it is an admission that the world, even the universe, are not "perfect."

      Either we are not able to properly calibrate the length of Earth's year and divide it into a set of equal parts or the length of the Earth's year is not conducive to doing so.

     In fact, the Earth and its orbit are not "perfect."

      That was not always understood.

     Johannes Kepler had a model of the universe in which "he conceived of the planetary orbits as embedded in concentric spheres that were separated by perfect polyhedral shapes."

     How nice if the world - and life in general - were so orderly that we could experience everything as symmetrical and sensible.

     Alas for us who would like things that way, life is untidy. It surprises and disappoints - and it surprises and excites.

     Most of us long for some sense of stability in at least some areas of our lives. For those who seek societal and political stability the more things change the more insistent they become that things return to "the way they were" - whether they were ever actually that way or not.

     I am enrolled on a social media site and find myself sometimes repelled by the level of profanity that is used. I swear (pun intended) that the use of foul language on social media, but also on public media (television) has increased dramatically over the past few years.

     I confess that in my lesser moments I view those who fill their social media postings - and those television writers who fill their television scripts - with foul language to be crass and stupid. In truth they are not stupid, merely crass.

     It is so unnecessary to use such language. It demeans the user and offends many listeners.

     I find myself yearning for that long-off and never-actually-was-time when people were better educated and expressed themselves more eloquently. I also confess to occasionally - really, very rarely - yielding to the impulse to use profane language myself. Perhaps once every few years. And almost always while alone in my car. But I always feel badly about it.

     But the point is that as the condition worsens, as profanity shows up more and more, I find myself more bothered by it and more convinced that there was a Golden Age to which we ought to return.

     It is that false vision of the Golden Age of the past, and the false hope that we can return to it, that I am thinking about.

     I see so many today who I believe in and long for an America that never was and long for a return to it: an America where everyone was happy with their lot (including women and gays and African-Americans), where everyone was religious - the "right" religion, where everyone had a middle-income job, where taxes were low and where we lived in a world that was safe because America was strong.

     In our world that is changing and "globalizing" there are people more fervent than ever in their desire to return to that Golden Age.

     But that world never existed.

     We live in a world of religious diversity - and ethnic and cultural diversity.

     That disappoints some; I hope it excites us.

     May we all keep our vision on the future and what could become rather than on the past and what never was.