Don't It Feel Like ANYTHING Can Happen in 2026?

There was a Wyclef Jean song from 1997 called “Anything Can Happen.” He rattles off a list of things that can happen and answers affirmatively. Until he gets to the Knicks winning a championship. Punchline: “No no no, that won’t happen.”

This year the Knicks won their first championship since 1973. 1 But that isn’t the only reason I feel like anything can happen this year. The Democratic Socialists won even more primaries in states like Colorado. But that isn’t the only reason I am overwhelmed by possibility like I am by oxygen at a casino. The latest Star Wars movie made less money than two non-IP originals (Obsession and Backrooms [the latter of which I wrote about back in 2023]).

And now the day before yesterday, a thrill-seeking couple got arrested for proposing on top of the Empire State Building after unfurling a banner that had this message: “When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace.” This happening less than two weeks after Liz Lenkinski and I separately stated the intention to manifest the summer of love here and here respectively.

To be sure, when I say “anything can happen,” I’m not expecting only good things. Anyone born in 1976 like myself or younger in America has grown up with a dark mushroom-shaped cloud lingering overhead: the threat of war with Iran. In the middle of February, I texted Daniel Falatko and Ross Barkan news about…I don’t remember honestly, something about tension between aircraft carriers or something. Falatko’s response was they have been talking about war with Iran for decades and it never happened. I agreed, adding that war with Iran was like that novel America has been promising to write for decades. This year, it has published that novel and we can even expect sequels around the corner.

This makes 2026 a special year: one of those mythical years in which “everything changed.” I turned 50 in February so I have only lived through two of those years: 1992 and 2004. In 1992: grunge took over; Reservoir Dogs won Sundance, signaling a directional shift from the boomer liberalism that had previously been awarded; “The Larry Sanders Show” and “The Ben Stiller Show” debuted, alongside banner years for “Seinfeld,” “The Simpsons” and “Saturday Night Live.” Speaking of SNL, they had the first hit movie based off their sketch characters since The Blues Brothers: Wayne’s World. “Nuthin’ But a G Thang” was released, ushering in the gangsta rap era and ending pop rap for good. Music was less polished than it was in the ‘80s. Comedy was smarter. Everything felt more raw and authentic. I was sixteen, so I didn’t put everything through a jeweler’s loop yet. The feeling was enough.

2004 was admittedly a less dramatic year, but there was some serious momentum then too. Garden State introduced the normie world to The Shins, thus the indie twerp era began. “The Daily Show” covered the election with its Indecision 2004 reporting, earning them a Peabody. Jon Stewart went on “Crossfire” and lambasted the hosts (one of them Tucker Carlson) for their sensationalism. Fahrenheit 9/11 was released to rave reviews and blockbuster numbers: the first documentary to fill theaters in decades. Most of all, 2004 was the year of the blog. Wonkette and Daily Kos were increasingly cited by by legacy publications covering the 2004 election. After the election blogs would lose their mainstream legitimacy but it was too late. Music blogs had their own ecosystem of indie bands. Comedy blogs would push the new alternative comedy.

Yes, social media was also gaining ground in 2004. Abu Ghraib happened and Dubya was reelected. Just like in 1992, the cops who beat up Rodney King were acquitted and Los Angeles was on fire. Again, anything could happen, good or bad. Everything changed, for better and for worse.

Why am I leaving out the 2010s? Can it really be said there were no years where everything changed? The two years that came close — 2011 and 2016 — were marked more by what almost happened than what did. In those years we saw the limits of what could happen. In 2011, Occupy Wall Street was defeated in Zuccotti Park. It was like Paris 1968 without the rest of the Sixties leading up to it. First time tragedy second time farce. Yes, OK, 2016 gave us Trump and the algorithm, but let’s not forget the DNC’s bias against Bernie Sanders, ignoring the will of the electorate to push the more reliably centrist Hilary Clinton. The DSA mania happening now could have been happening a decade ago.

Yet another way that the 2010s was like the 1950s — much like the McCarthyism and general repression of the ‘50s was the pressure cooker, trying to keep the spirit of the beatniks, the beboppers and the rockers under the lid until it all blew up in the ‘60s, it can be said that what was repressed in the 2010s returned with a vengeance in the 2020s. In addition to the leftist spirit, the 2020s has seen the return of indie rock, alt-lit, even the alt-clown scene that began in the 2010s in LA and Philly primarily is gaining momentum.

Now I will not join the rest of the press and say that this clown scene is the hottest thing going. But it feels like it is about to blow up. What’s more, I go to the shows not because they are trendy, not even to laugh — I still maintain stand-up is better for that — but because in these shows, I have never been able to predict what will happen next. There is almost zero repetition. If you liked what you just saw, cherish the memory; you will probably never see it again. It is the opposite of the algorithm.

I am not following the World Cup closely, but I am excited by the possibility that, between Egypt, Ghana and Mexico, a nation that is not European or South American might win the entire championship for the first time in history this year.

2025 was the first true 2020s year. But as I said, 1965 was the first ‘60s year while 1966 was the first psychedelic year. Or 2003 was the first ‘00s year but 2004 was the year everything changed. The beginning of the trip is not the same as the peak of the trip. So expect some insanity between this year right up to 2029, probably right past that point as well.

Or maybe I’m having a manic episode. None of the therapists I have been to have diagnosed me as bipolar but I have noticed an aversion to diagnosis in the community. Oh well, anything is possible.