I remember last New Years Eve. Next-door party. Lots of chips, and my first foray into 7 Layer Dip (which looks so nice until you take a bite and then the dish looks all gross!). I remember Champagne and a Christmas tree brushing the top of a cathedral ceiling, the needles dry and presents unwrapped sitting under the tree. And I remember learning that Journey song 'Don't Stop Believing' on the out of tune piano and playing it over and over again until I could play it with the funky rhythm right. We played tag and hide-and-go-seek with way to much shrieking and hiding. And playing speed and some board game. And the game with stacking cups. And counting down till midnight, surrounded by good people, and the kids throwing torn paper down from the balcony.
You see, I can remember. The past. I forget that I used to remember sometimes. It feels strange to have the past in my mind when five minutes ago is gone. That was a good New Years Party. And I went home really late, crossing the grass in-between our houses in the pitch blackness, running, a nervous knot in my stomach until the motion light clicked on the side of our house.
I do remember, you know.
I was sick then. I think a cold, or perhaps the beginning of a flu or something. Or I was getting over something. I wasn't right and things weren't right but it was too perfect to say it. Ever been in that place? Where something is so wrong and to say it would break the spell that makes it appear okay? So wrong it's right almost, you don't want to crack open that ugliness and feel the truth.
But this time it doesn't feel cheesy to make some New Years hopes. To want a better year in 2009, for all of you and for me. 'Cause next year is going to be hard, but it's going to be different. It's going to hurt and it's going to get bad so it can get good. I put all that hope for a new year out there. That this year, things will be better. A year is a long time. A long time to change.
People always said life isn't fair, it's just I never understood what that meant.
