Hope smiles from the threshold of the year to come, whispering, ‘It will be happier.’
-Alfred Lord Tennyson
We all celebrate the birth of a new year in different ways.
My grown kids, for example, are still at the age where they think getting all dressed up and going out on New Year’s Eve is fun. This is probably because a hangover in your twenties is NOTHING like having one when you’re closer to sixty. I don’t know this for a fact, but can only imagine how lousy I’d feel the next morning if I had more than a glass of wine in one sitting. Maybe I’m lucky. Any more than that puts me to sleep within an hour.
Which is why, like all years, the most thrilling thing I did on New Year’s Eve is watch the ball drop in Times Square and contemplate how it is possible for a million souls to crowd into an area before 9 a.m. just to stand until midnight to yell “Happy New Year!” before they run like crazy out of there to find the nearest bathroom. Because that’s exactly what I’d have to do if I stood in the cold that long, let me tell you. A few years ago I remember reading about how many of the revelers in New York City wore adult diapers so that they could, um, “revel” until the wee hours without fear of going you-know-what you know where.
New Year’s Eve in Times Square? Thanks, but no. Just…no. I’ll pass.
Diapers or not, it is a bright and shiny new year, though, so that’s good. We all need one. The holidays are over and most of the fudge is gone. Our kids have gone back to lives more exciting than the one we are happy living. The ornaments are packed away for another year.I’ve pretty much exhausted all creative options for reintroducing what’s left of the Christmas ham, and I’m craving bowling alley pizza. I hear that there’s a snowstorm heading east again this week which means more shoveling and sliding around on roads than I’d prefer. You don’t get everything you want in life. Especially in January in Minnesota.
But it’s still good, isn’t it? This sitting by the fire-reading a book-watching the snow fall time of year? This time of bundling up and waiting it out? Maybe if we’re feeling particularly adventurous we go a little nuts and venture out for a pizza with good friends who aren’t nursing hangovers or wearing diapers either.
We all celebrate the birth of new year differently, it’s true.
I like my way the best. Happy 2017!
The Loon Whisperer 
I’m with you my friend! and diapers to watch the ball drop? Insane at best is my thought! I don’t find that much beauty in it to wait that long and the aftermath cleanup! Nope, I vote for the bowling alley pizza and watch it on tv! Happy New Year and keep those posts coming. I enjoy them so much!