31st December, 2008:
I am back home (rather early) from Church. I am still sitting in my New-Year-Mass-Church-Clothes, sipping wine, daintily nibbling on plum cake, feeling very chic and lady-like as I furiously type and re-type my thoughts... There’s a good 40 minutes to herald the new-year and I am riding the emotional roller-coaster...
I feel disappointed that I will be home alone, again, with my parents asleep & brother watching TV. I feel somewhat frustrated for not being at some party yelling over the LOUD music to talk to my friends and screaming TEN, NINE... counting down last few seconds of the old year. And, in an instant, the disappointment & frustration fades away, and I, realise, that I’m simply acting like a spoilt child who wants a new toy, not because she needs it, but because all her friends have it... Feeling mature and enlightened, I squash the irrational sadness... Good for me!
I feel defiant, as I ignore the sounds of the TV (watching TV to celebrate New Year is decidedly LAME) & strains of trance from the terrace party in the building. I feel liberated as I sit here writing this, impervious to the sights and sounds around me, still dressed in my pretty pink dress and super-high heels, silently protesting against the injustice around me - my family, already fast asleep, television’s uninspiring “New Year Specials” featuring wannabe stars and upstarts and have-beens; parties featuring drunken people and deafening music.
I feel oddly excited at the prospect of a new beginning, and instantly I feel irritated for falling for that cliché... I mean, what’s so new about the New Year anyway?? The day will begin in exactly the same way it has this past year and the year before that and the year before that and you get the picture. People around me are not going to change overnight either (sure, some may be stupid and sick from the previous night’s drunkenness but they’ll get over that in a few hours!) The politicians will be just as corrupt, the trains will be equally crowded, and my parents fussy as always... So, basically, life as I know it will go on... What will change is the date on the calendar and even as far as the date goes, it takes me at least a good 2 weeks to get used to writing the “new year” in the date... So, where, I demand to know, is the NEWNESS to this all???
I feel terribly nostalgic... Looking back at the year gone by, I realise, with much satisfaction, that it has been a year of happy change and many firsts! Okay, flashback:Last year the newness of the new year, set in only in June, after almost half a year had past, when I went back to my old office to work on “Asia’s FIRST ever event of its kind in the world of finance!” Then, I later won my FIRST ever national award, and had my FIRST ever interview on national TV and my FIRST ever pictures in the newspapers, posing gleefully with my shiny trophy.
And, for the FIRST (and maybe the last) time ever in my life, I worked up the courage to make the “FIRST move” with a cutie-pie firang... (Unfortunately, things fizzled out after a while depriving me of my FIRST ever boy-friend story!).
I learnt to eat with chopsticks (and I would gloat about trying sushi for the FIRST time, but some may argue that since the crab meat was cooked it wasn’t authentic SUSHI...Well, whatever...)
I wore BLACK nail polish for the FIRST time ever, much to the amusement of some, shock of others and surprisingly, My MOTHER said it actually looked good! Go figure!
AND I had a whole glass of alcohol for the FIRST time ever. (Note: I have had wine before, in glasses meant for Tequila Shots, but I do NOT consider wine as “alcohol”, it’s good for the heart and all). And for those of you, who are frowning and shaking your heads with displeasure, let me explain why I felt compelled to resort to Fosters (Aus-trra-lee-yan for Beer). It was a family get-together hosted at my place and the conversation at the “party” included nagging (targeted at yours truly of course! About, well, I lost track - everything, I guess); passive aggressive remarks, lame jokes (meant mostly to hide discomfort, I suppose) and many half-hearted hmmms & hmpfs. So, with the nerve-wracking, strained atmosphere making me feel pathetic, I decided to test the sorrow-drowning-powers of alcohol and desperately poured myself my first glass of beer. My mother was shocked that I was having my first glass of BEER & my aunt was surprised that this was my FIRST glass of beer! But, it worked because after a while I was wrapped in a comfortable cloud of fuzziness that absorbed the jeers and nagging and sad humour. And, thanks to my little adventure with alcohol (one small glass of wine followed by one medium sized glass of beer) I had my FIRST ever brush with ALMOST-Drunkenness...
But the best part about last year, FRIENDS – I made some new ones, stayed in touch with ALL the old ones, got back in touch with some long lost ones, celebrated as 3 of them got married...
Okay, back to present day:
It is now almost 2 hours into the New Year... and my spirits are buoyed, partly because of the wine and partly because I spoke to many of my friends who, like me are also at home BUT unlike me are sleepy! (Hah!) I have changed out of my party clothes (gosh! Those heels were killing me!). The raucous building party seems to have ended or at least the music has stopped, and I have danced my little jig to “celebrate the new year” too. Now it’s just me, and my laptop that is softly humming some happy songs.
And, all I can think of is the profound statement muttered by one sleepy friend – “People don’t realise they can have fun without excuses”. And that is so true, I realise, contemplating my “Year of Many FIRSTS” that has just recently become a part of history... It is funny how we look for reasons to enjoy – “Let’s go for a movie coz the exams are over”, “We’ll celebrate AFTER the presentation”, “Party? Let me land a job, though!”
My year – the one of black nail polish and beer, of first moves and friends, of long conversations that run into almost the next morning and learning to eat with chopsticks – has been a series of happy memories where I enjoyed (in the company of friends and sometimes, even alone), not feeling the need to justify why I was celebrating, simply being impulsive, living in the moment. My year has been a happy one because I had “fun without making excuses”. Know what I mean??
Well, Happy New Year anyway!
Psychedelic night
