My New Year's Dissolution

To Whom It May Concern:

Happy New Year.

It’s really a bit of an understatement isn’t it? Are you telling me that it is, in fact a happy new year or are you commanding me to be happy in said year? Either way, I think you’re off.

Of course you may be insinuating something here as well. By making sure to mention that the new year should be happy you obviously are inferring that the past year was, at best, less happy than the year to come or, at worst, pretty damn crappy. Well now you may be on to something.
You must understand that I can’t process the idea of a happy new year without taking a glance at the previous three hundred and sixty five days. And when I do that the only feeling that comes upon me is melancholy. Don’t get me wrong – the year was filled with amazing things. I experienced joys and triumphs that may take residence in the pantheon of “best moments ever.” Yet I still feel sad.

Ok, maybe sad isn’t the right word. Wistful? Yeah, that sounds a little less harsh and defeatist.

Anyway, I have come to realize that we aren’t celebrating a new beginning on the first of January as much as we are putting to rest a marathon of experiences on the last day of December. Be honest – you’re glad it’s over. All the high expectations that gave way to a reality of slip ups, put offs, and don’t care anymores culminating in a home stretch of “why the hell am I spending all this money for people I barely know?” that we call the holidays. Wrapped in all that are my countless disappointments and short comings, wagging their wicked little talons at me and calling me a litany of names I know too well: Loser. Quitter. Failure.

It would be easy to go on. With very little effort this little missive could easily explode into a manifesto of bullet points and exegesis regarding the suckitude of the past year. But there’s still one little, nagging, bastard of a virtue that prevents me from such pomposity – hope.

When the clock strikes midnight, the ball drops, and the cyborg formerly known as Dick Clark announces the new year I always, without fail, hear the little voice that says, “This next year is going to be a good one.” And I believe it. I have to believe it. By adopting the hope that the next year will be one of optimistic possibility I am able to give the proverbial finger to all my inner naysayers. It doesn’t shut them up – but it pisses them off enough that they fail to maintain control over my attitude and my psyche.

I’m realistic about it. I know that I will fail this year. I know that I will make promises and then break them. I will start races and never finish. But at the end of the day (and year) I will have at least tried. I will have once again put forth an effort to persevere even when everything around me is telling me to just give up. And when another year passes I will hear that familiar voice remind me that, “This next year is going to be a good one.”

So Happy New Year.

Happy New Year, indeed.

Regards,

Me