Here’s what’s new in the world of New Mobility: We’re starting the new year off a bit lighter — this issue weighs a little less than usual. We hope this is temporary, in the same way we hope the economic reality that dictates fewer pages this month is also short-lived.

We’ve made some changes in our lineup of columns. Dee Sandin has moved on to greener pastures, so the inside back cover will no longer feature her snarky stories in BentSpoke, so aptly named. Also gone from the back page is BackSpin, that strange and witty “good month/bad month” pairing that Roxanne Furlong had so much fun with. Callahan, you’ll be glad to know, is still with us. His fiendishly original cartoons have moved up to the front of the magazine, tucked neatly alongside our monthly Letters.

There are other changes: Josie Byzek, our resident MS expert, has bequeathed her MS Life column to Jennifer Gerics, a NM rookie who we expect to ably fill Josie’s shoes, or at least one of them: Starting next month, look for MS Life to alternate with PPS Forum. Our back page will now be dedicated to a Q-and-A — Verbatim — edited by Josie and featuring her choice of interesting personalities from the disability community.

Another new bimonthly column, Firsts, will debut in our February issue. This one, dedicated to you, our readers, will replace Single in the City. Each installment will feature mini-stories from readers responding to topics announced in advance.

Other than these changes, everything remains the same, except for one really big transformative event scheduled for Jan. 20 — the inauguration of our 44th president of the United States. Regardless of your political leanings, you’ve got to admit we live in exciting times.

I’ve written in this space before that the 1960s and the present have much in common. Most of you are too wet behind the ears to remember The Man, a fictional book about the first black president of the United States, set in 1964, the same year the book was published. Fittingly, that was also the year of the landmark Civil Rights Act, which eventually formed the bedrock for the ADA. In many ways this 44-year-old book, written by Irving Wallace, was prophetic, but the differences between fiction and reality, then and now, give us reason for hope.

The Man was a “what if?” book, the kind of imaginative leap that turns on an intriguing plot. It was also a New York Times bestseller, and subsequently, a 1972 movie starring James Earl Jones.

In the fictional story, a black man becomes president by accident of presidential succession, as if it could never happen in the real world. By contrast, Barack Obama became president by design. The fictional black president is besieged by doubts and manipulative attempts by those around him. Obama exudes confidence, and his directorial control of his campaign has been hailed as masterful.

But the main reason he was elected — in my view — was because voters saw in him a man capable of transcending politics for the good of the nation. This in itself restores hope.

So what’s new? Everything. Every day, every breath, every thought.