To New Beginnings

Greetings and salutations.

My grandmum always told me that the first day of your new year reflects how the rest of your year will turn out. Of course, if this were true, a vast majority of us would spend every single day of every single year suffering from hangovers and sleep deprivation. Happily, this isn’t the case. But I guess the belief has been too firmly ingrained in my mind, and so I try as far as possible to spend the first day of every new year in relative happiness. After all, there’s no saying how the rest of the year is going to turn out.

This year, I brought in the new year with a warm hug and cool wine. I spent the following few hours engaged in conversation, sleep and other pleasant activities. And I began the first day of the rest of this year with a breakfast of coffee (nice attempt, Koltrain), peanut butter on toast and apple juice. With two large cats and a very loving Labrador around, all of whom were duly petted. Oh, and really good music on my way back home (thank god for Sony Walkman phones).

The sum total of all these is a strange sense of happiness, peace and general well-being. So, while I bask in the glow of this totally uncharacteristic mood – a warm combination of inner tranquility, a belief in the goodness of mankind, a love for small, furry animals and totally inexplicable contentment – I leave you with heartfelt wishes for a wonderful new year.

I suggest you take them. I might not be so generous again.