The skies above are clear again

"Happy days are here again

Let us sing a song of cheer again

Happy days are here again.

"Altogether, shout it out,

There's no one who can doubt it now

So let's tell the world about it now

Happy days are here again."

--Milton Ager and Jack Yellin, music and lyrics, respectively

Written and first performed during the depths of the Great Depression, the song was adopted as the theme for Franklin D. Roosevelt's successful campaign for president in 1932. It expressed the optimism that Roosevelt would bring to the nation. The song also is associated with the repeal of Prohibition, that ill-fated social experiment that limited personal freedom.

So here's a wish for the return of happy days, when, as the lyrics promise, "your cares and troubles are gone ... They'll be no more from now on."