Monday, January 02, 2006

The Fun Begins . . .

Happy New Year, everyone!

Tomorrow the vacation is over, we jump into the fray again. Today I had lunch with my friend, J, at an Afghan place nearby. J, if you are reading this, I send a cheery wave hello!

It is so weird to tell someone I know so well about the existence of this blog. Mr. Random knows that I have one, but he doesn’t read it. I certainly hope I don’t come off as too whiny and annoying . . .

In the 2006, my mantra is to take things one day at a time and try not to get too stressed out about the job. We’ll see how long that lasts . . .

Today was dark and rainy and dreary and sleepy, the kind of day when you just want to crawl under a comforter and sit on the couch and read, read, read. I was surprised to see so many other people out and about today at the shopping centers . . . last weekend there weren’t nearly so many people shopping, as far as I could tell . . .

New Year’s Eve was a quiet one . . . Mr. Random and I bought ourselves a dozen vanilla-frosted cupcakes and a quart of Double Fudge Brownie ice cream, and ate ourselves into a sugar coma while watching MTV. We watched ABC for a minute to see Dick Clark. You can tell that he had a stroke – his speech was definitely slurred – but you could also tell that he did an amazing amount of work to get to the point where he was. It made me a bit sad to see him that way, but only because it was another reminder of how everything is constantly changing . . . how we all are getting older, and those people and things that seemed they would be around forever are now fading into history. It’s similar to all those people who mention how they used to watch Guy Lombardi play “Auld Lang Syne” . . . soon it will be all of us saying how we used to watch Dick Clark on TV way back when, and our puzzled grandchildren will say, “Who?”

This was the first year that I celebrated the holidays without my grandmother nearby. Mr. Random’s grandmother is turning 90 years old on Saturday. My parents turn 60 in a couple of months. All of these people that I love and respect and have been a part of my life for so long are growing older too. One day, they too will just be a name on the back of a picture, a “do you remember” person . . . I don’t know if I am ready to handle the passing of time in this way yet. I still miss my grandpa more than ever before, and almost 19 years have passed since he died. But I will have to handle it . . . time does not stop . . . those we love will be gone someday . . . and all of the people, those famous and those not-so-much, who served as the background noise of our lives will be gone too.

My! These are very sobering thoughts to be having today. To lighten the mood, I will end with a quote that has always stuck with me from my favorite children’s book, L.M. Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables:

"Tomorrow is always fresh with no mistakes in it."

I hope tomorrow goes well for you all!

2 comments:

Merci said...

I've been keenly aware of the passing of time and irreversible changes lately, too. I remember when my family spent New Year's Eve with Guy Lombardo, before Dick Clark became the one to watch. Most people today would say, "Guy Who?"

I loved Anne, too, as I loved all of the Alcott characters, and later the Austen characters.

Virginia Gal said...

Passing of time, people, makes me sad (I bury my head in the sand and not think about it).

Do you know I have never read Anne of Green Gables, all my friends in college were shocked!

Happy New Year!