A New Year

January 1, 2018

Mozart from the radio downstairs, a New Year’s festival of composers who lived in Vienna. The day is bright but wondrous cold. The stream my pump makes in the pond is slush, while the rest is frozen.

Last night’s New Year’s Party– which, to be clear, was suggested by other people– turned out interestingly, in that not one guest came. Not one. I estimate that $300 worth of food, drink, and other supplies is laid up downstairs, much of it to go to utter waste. Won’t even mention the labor of preparation. The supplies of liquor will be used through time. A giant tub of bourbon/milk punch sits in a pot on the back porch, probably a lovely mellow slush in the cold. Beside it is a cooler filled with redundant ice. I did freeze as much chili as I could get into the fridge.  On the lawn at dawn landed the homemade bread and the white cake with lemon filling, for the delight of the crows. In the fridge is a casserole which may have significant shelf-life, and two cheesecakes, so exquisite and so labor-intensive that I couldn’t bring myself to throw them out right away. I know have enough paper plates and such to host an Army battalion picnic.  Ice had come onto the streets, so the TV said. Each phoned with their horror story about driveways and slopes and I said, “Oh, that’s all right, be safe!” I went driving to test this, and couldn’t make myself skid even when I tried. But, everywhere might have been worse than the blocks around my house. I cleaned up and was in bed by 10:30, my regrets, if they existed at all, subdued. The last few awful things that have happened to me I have greeted with a breezy “oh well!”  Is this the mellowing of age, or giving up? Circe gazed up at me to say, “What was all the fuss bout?” She loves company and was anticipating high times. I will put this down as the last disgust of a disgusting year, allow 2018 to be still pristine. 

New Year’s Day itself: wrote a little, cleaned up the non-party mess a little, watched most of the Harry Potter films on TV. I tend to find Harry Potter forgettable, so each viewing is a surprise.