Sunday, January 1, 2012

Something New Year's

As I write this, I am beginning the process of coming down from a quintessentially bacchanalian New Year's Eve party. It was a small one by comparison with those that I am aware other friends participated in, but then any gathering of two people would have to be more wild a party than I am accustomed to. I have in years past most typically stayed with my family back home through New Year's Day, the better to watch college football (as no one here is much for the amateur variety).

That makes the bowl games of New Year's Day fine, but then what of the night before? Well, I can tell you with years of personal experience to back me up that there are some remarkable tv show marathons to choose from. Most commonly I favored the 'Twilight Zone' ones, and watched some classic television into the wee hours of the new year as the VCR clock turned over at midnight. I can say that makes for a less and less satisfying New Year's.

Of course I wanted the wild parties that I saw on TV and in movies. There was loud music, there was liquor, there were neckties worn about the head and lampshades adorning the same. I wanted this. I wanted also the quieter, more sentimental experiences of the kiss and midnight and the softly spoken promises of a better self for the new year. I don't know how you get both, but that is what I wanted for myself all the years that socializing was an academic figment of the imagination.

These days I live in more practical terms, and those less vicarious all the time. Some of what I wanted I have gotten, but not all. The mildly debauched things are easy to come by, but the severely so ones are less so, and the sentimental pleasures of New Year's are evidently the most elusive of all. At my age though, it seems that there is time to find the things that I have not yet, as there are probably several more New Year's parties to be had in the absence of an employer and fellow employees whose respect I have to have.

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