Happy Year?

*note: I really did write this on New Years Day, from a chair in a hospital room while listening to Dad read out loud from Elder Holland's new book. It's just not getting posted until now. You understand, of course.

Am I suppoosed to acknowledge the new year somehow? Honestly, all it means to me is that I have to remember a new number on my checks. And that I have to change the big calendar at school. But New Years has never been a big deal to me. See, I don't believe in "New Year's Resolutions". I just don't find it to be a healthy way for me to make goals. And on top of that, New Years Eve is something I make less eventful on purpose. Perhaps it's my own way of rebelling against the push for conformity. I don't want to fulfill a social obligation to go to a dance. If I don't want to go to a dance the rest of the year, why would I want to start on New Year's Eve? If I don't want to get drunk the rest of the year, Why should I want to start on New Year's Eve? If I don't want to kiss someone the rest of the year, why would I want to kiss or be kissed on New Year's Eve? And I don't want to go to dances. I want to dance, but completely on my own, to the music in my brain, not obligated by social rules and expectations. And I don't want to get drunk. Well, most of the time I don't want to get drunk. But wanting to and doing it are two entirely different entities. And as for kissing someone, you don't need to know whether or not there is anyone out there that I want to kiss, or who that person happens to be. You should know that when said kiss happens, it won't be because either of us is obligated to perform a tradition. It will be because we want to. And for those of you that think the tradition is just a nice excuse to get to kiss the person you already want to kiss, I say that if he doesn't have the guts to kiss me simply because he wants to, then I probably don't want to be kissing him.

Whoa, That was a lot of opinion. The thing is, I have a hard time calling this a "New Year" when it is in fact an old year revisited. We all have our routines. They are most obnoxiously pointed out to us by the number of tv commercials that push me to set a "resolution" to lose weight, and then a month later they force me to admit that I have already ruined the resolution, and therefore ruined a perfectly good year that was "New" just a few weeks earlier. Why should I let the media tell me that the year's efforts are already ruined before January is even out the door? No thank you! I like my years just the way they are! I can set goals outside the confines of a calendar, and in so doing, I can take each year for exactly what it is. I can grow and shrink according to the season of my life, all the while sticking with the routine that is every year. Somewhere in mid-January, I will start thinking about the meaning of the new year and having regrets and anxiety about how far I have not come in my life. And somewhere towards the end of January I will finally convince myself that my job and my college degree do not define me, therefore I can't judge my success according to my lack of Master's Degree. And somewhere in February I will start the anxiety and self-loathing about the marital status thing, but by the 14th I will recognize the ridiculousness of the whole thing, call it "yet another fabricated tradition" and ignore the day entirely. Since I am not in Minnesota anymore, I won't have to start desperately pleading for some sign of spring in the end of Feb, I will simply enjoy the melt-off of the snow, enjoy watching it fall again even more, and have the comfort of knowing that soon it will be gloriously 95 degrees and I will finally be able to take off my long sleeves in order to blind the population of the entire state with my pasty arms. Don't worry, I stopped revealing my pasty-er legs years ago. I may gradually gain a healthy glow throughout the summer, due to recess time and long walks in the mountains. During the summer I will be at the heigth of happiness emotionally, and come fall I will celebrate one year of being back home. I will again take a ridiculous number of pictures of changing leaves and mountains covered in reds and yellows. By the time the first snow falls, I will be anxious to walk in it and break out my ever-so-coordinated snow accesories. Come the holidays I will be again stressed but better prepared emotionally to face them, except for one thing. I used all my best "forgotten carols" on my blog already. I guess I better get started on new ones then.

So I am not wishing you a happy new year. I am wishing you, my friends, Happy Every Year.