…to grandmother’s house-of-crazy we go.  At least, that's one of our holiday songs.

 

Thank goodness the bulk of the holiday season is behind us and the non-stop parade of wacky people and insane amounts of food are slowly coming to an end.  The construction on my son’s four foot 739 piece video rollercoaster model is almost complete and if my husband and I are still speaking to one another when it is over, it will be another of the season’s miracles (getting my kitchen table back after this week long project will be another).

 

I am not quite ready to take a restorative breath yet though, as I know that all of the madness is not completely over.  We still have New Year’s Eve to get through.  The last majorly indulgent meal of party season will come to a close on Thursday night and bleary eyes will greet the fresh year and new decade on Friday morning.  My son is looking forward to ringing in midnight with the other crazy kids on our street who run out into the cul-de-sac with horns, tubas and whatever noisemakers they can drag out of the house.  For miles, dogs from every hill and canyon join in with barking and howling that continues long after the young crumbcrushers are forced back inside by parents that should have held them down, and hidden those darn tubas, in the first place.  If I sound overly snarky it’s only because I am a world class sleeper – who could win an award for the sport if people would learn to recognize it – a flute or clarinet I know I could sleep through, but tubas are my limit, without medical intervention.

 

At the beginning of the week I read a great piece about “Resolutionaries” – the people who militantly make their resolutions at the beginning of January and then spend the rest of the month valiantly trying to keep them.  By February, many Resolutionaries are defeated – that is until December rolls around once more and they’ll try-try again.  I am not one of those.  Maybe I was when I was young and naïve, but Icy-Hot patches on my aching sacroiliac help me keep cool about that whole turning-over-a-new-leaf each year business.  Honestly, I’m just grateful for Monday mornings as a rule, because each week gives me a chance to start fresh.  Waiting for a whole year to get in that mindset after I turned 40 didn’t work anymore, as life lessons (such as the loss of business, savings and loved ones) teach you to not to be so arrogant about the promise of another day or week, much less a year, at a time.

 

Still, don’t you think there is something exciting about the calendar flipping over to a new decade?  In looking around, I see that these last ten years have been rough for a lot of households and I think we are all hoping that the “tens” will be kind to us.  In my household, right away, 2010 has change in the air – in all sizes.  For my oldest child it will be the year she graduates from high school and heads off to college.  The youngest is thrilled because he gets a season pass to Magic Mountain, since he became a genuine teenager this year (believe me, he thinks he’s King of the World because of it).  All around me doors are closing and others are opening, both small and large — I am excited to see what else is waiting down the road and who might be holding the keys.

 

Of course, there is that pesky “the sky is falling” catastrophe thing about the year 2012, but I don’t give that whole thing too much weight.  As a friend of mine said today at lunch, “Really, I just think the poor guy carving that calendar just got tired after awhile – you know, probably thought – Hey! Let somebody else finish it.”  I tend to agree.  After chiseling out 5,125 years of dates – who wouldn’t be pooped and maybe even a little passive-aggressive about the whole project?  Besides, if you look for doom, you’ll find doom.  And doom likes company, much in the way good ol’ fashioned misery does.  Let that group congregate and buy their own donuts.   The rest of us should be positive and try to rise above the muck and mire.  And potential mayhem (and maybe have a few bottles of water and flashlights around, just in case – I may not be pessimistic, but I am pragmatic).

 

Happy New Year and Decade to all!  May your heart, head and hearth be filled with all that you need, good health to enjoy it and a good enough attitude to realize all that you have.