I’ve never found New Years Eve to be a very festive occasion. The regrets of the past—not just of the previous year, but all the wreckage, sorrows, and mistakes that have thus far shaped the path behind—tend to be far more compelling. It’s no use trying to plaster over such introspection, as most people do, with alcohol and shouting. Fireworks are fine and I like them as much as anyone, but the feverish, almost desperate, partying people engage in so as not to have to confront the realities of the previous year, is pathetic. I’d rather face my pain with a clear head. This, of course, makes me unpleasant company at a New Years Eve party. It’s a good thing I don’t go to them.
Party, like love or truth, can mean whatever we want it to mean. Sometimes love means like or desire or the lesser of evils. Sometimes truth means a better, more tolerable, sort of lie. Often party means compulsive self-distraction. I can count the number of parties where I’ve had fun on one hand. Most have been dreadful and tedious, whether I was sober or not. And, though I know the natural response is, “you are such a wretched, misanthropic, introverted son-of-a-bitch that you don’t know what fun is,” I think I do know. At least, I know what it isn’t. It’s not a night of forced cheer and denial, for one thing.
Woo. Happy New Year. Now get back in your cage.
