It seems the end of each year provides good time for reflection.

It’s a time to look back at the year past — the good and bad — a time to evaluate the year’s life lessons and a time to share the stories close to the heart. It’s also a time to, in a sense, begin anew as the clock strikes midnight, rolling in another calendar year.

A new year provides this time, but what about a new decade?

Looking back 10 years is a bit more overwhelming, or at least it is for me.

In the year 2000, I started high school. Ten years later I have been in the “real world” for two years.

In the year 2000, I survived the Y2K, the first-predicted end of the world. Now, I’m awaiting my next end in just two years.

In the last 10 years, I’ve been a teenage driver, soccer player, high school art student, a college student studying sports management, a college student studying journalism, a college newspaper editor and now, The Messenger’s news editor.

Ten years later, a lot has changed in my life. I can’t really imagine what else will evolve in my life in the next decade.

While no one can predict my future, an article from Smartmoney.com has made some financial predictions for us all.

The article titled, “10 things not to buy in 2010,” predicts those items that us consumers shouldn’t waste money on in the next decade, things predicted to be obsolete in years to come.

Some were not surprising to me — home phone service, gas-guzzling cars and energy-inefficient homes and appliances.

With the evolution of cell phones, computers and Skype, Smartmoney reports landlines could eventually become a thing of the past.

Purchasing fuel-efficient cars and appliances only makes good fiscal sense with prices on the rise.

But, there were several things on the list that caught my attention: DVDs, compact digital cameras, CDs and external hard drives.

With DVD purchase prices averaging $20, the article reports that Netflix and movies on demand are much cheaper options. For CDs, purchasing songs on iTunes and loading them directly to an iPod are just easier, the Web site reports.

The reasoning behind the digital camera argument is picture quality. Smartmoney said compact-digital cameras will soon become a thing of the past, as bulkier, SLR digital cameras are proving better quality.

External hard drives are good ways to back up computer files, and they don’t come with a real high price tag. But, the Web site reports there are now Internet sites to purchase storage space on the Web. Though, they are more expensive than hard drives.

Many of these soon to be obsolete predictions I find hard to believe. It hasn’t been too long since DVDs became popular, since I had my first car with a CD player in it or since I purchased a digital camera.

And, I haven’t even gotten around to purchasing an external hard drive yet.

Though it seems hard to believe, when back 10 years, Smartmoney might not be too far off.

We’ve gone from videos to VHS, regular box televisions to flat-screen high definition TVs, pagers to cell phones, desktop computers to laptops to even computers on your phones — and the list could go on.

In the year 2000, I would have never thought of most of the technology I’ve seen progress. So, who’s to say what will be obsolete by 2020?

It’s not me, for certain. So I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.

Holli Keaton is the news editor of The Messenger. She can be reached at 670-6313 or holli.keaton@troymessenger.com.