January first is, after all, just a day. We fill it with our highest expectations and with our brightest hopes. We anticipate its coming and stay up late enough to see it arrive. The celebration of a new year is a double-edged razor. Before the mirrored ball drops to begin the new year, we pause from our daily routine to open our box of memories and count the grand victories and the spectacular defeats of the old year.
It is a sad fact of human nature that our minds hold the memories of the good things in our lives but our hearts store the regrets. If we made a list just of the good things that happened during the past year, the list would give us a glimmer of pride…of hope…of joy. But it would be a fleeting image as our hearts spill out the darker days…the losses we endured…the guilt we carry like Jacob Marley’s chains…the good deeds left undone.
Witness the popular end-of year TV specials. Every network will program the most sentimental music from “Auld Lang Sine” to “The Way we Were” as we share a long collective sigh about the great and the notorious people who died during 2021. The days between Christmas and January 1st give us pause to mourn the loss of friends and family during the year and, indeed, throughout our lives. We somehow equate the end of the year, even though it is just a selected designation on the calendar, with setting our grief behind us. We repack our hearts like Christmas boxes with each ornament carefully wrapped in memories and say a prayer to keep it safe from breaking.
There will be a few compilations of our victories. A few looks at how technology improves our lives, a nod to those kind souls working to feed the hungry or house the homeless, and gratitude to the dedicated caregivers who work to comfort those struck down by natural disasters. If you need an example of the weight we give to appreciating the good things, watch the national news broadcasts…after all the reports of horrible and terrifying events of the day, only the last two or three minutes are given to a feel-good story.
When I was younger I often woke on New Year’s morning bleary-eyed and nursing a terrible headache…not the best way to begin a season of renewal. I often wondered if we celebrated the end of one year’s troubles more than we anticipated great things for the next. During the past several years of war and natural disasters and Covid, I think we’re glad to see father time pass another portal.
Every year, Cheryl and I search through the TV listings for versions of A Christmas Carol. There was no intent to create the tradition, we sort of backed into it. It is not like we are watching to see what will happen to Tiny Tim or whether Ebenezer will finally learn his lesson. We all know what will happen. Unless you have lived your life in a treetop in the deepest Amazon rain forest, you know about the Cratchet family problems and the arrival of Marley’s ghost. We wait, all of us who watch, for the three spirits to manifest themselves.
Why do we continue to watch the story whether interpreted by Alister Sim or George C. Scott. We even watch versions with Scrooge Mc Duck or the Muppets or Mr. McGoo. What is it that draws us to the story and why is it shared over and over? I know we feel for tiny Tim and his family and we have all been hat-in-hand like Bob Crachett asking for time off, or a loan to tide us over, or even to the Big Man in the Sky for a little more time and a lot more mercy. I believe that what makes the story universal is that we all identify as Ebenezer Scrooge.
Hold on now. I am not calling you miserly, or flint-hearted or grouchy or even old. I am saying that among the sugar-coated memories of our past, we all carry images of lonely holidays and life-deep disappointments. We all live with the poor decisions we made and the important things we left undone. No one wants to grow up to be Scrooge but we all can hear him rattling around in our most secret regrets.
The impending New Year shakes our comfortable lives and opens our eyes to what didn’t happen again this year. Like the Ghost of Christmas Present, it shows the world as it is and not as we want it to be.
As the year closes, we review the choices which have led us to where we are. Choice is not to be understated. Things do happen to us over which we have no control but even within those events we make decisions, each of which leads us toward a thing we want or away from the things we dislike or even fear.
We all have memories, good and bad, of years past, plans and hopes for the year coming up and dreams and fears of what lies in the future. I believe that the Scrooge story is all about redemption. If that cranky old miser can rise above his years of “Bah Humbug!” and after an altar call from the Spirits, save Tiny Tim and dance at his nephew’s Christmas party, then maybe we, whose sins are many but whose intentions are good, can turn our corner…make our changes…find our redemption.
I know I write too much about hopefulness. I find it turns up in story after story. I guess I am what my old grandpappy would call an “infernal optimist”. According to him, that was someone who believed that things would get better and just wouldn’t shut the hell up about it.
With a new calendar year looming, we make those pesky resolutions, the same every year, about losing weight, about calling friends we miss, about writing those long-overdue “Thank You” notes. Our intentions are the best but somehow day-to-day life gets in the way and we often, before the end of the week, revert to our old hand-in-the-cookie-jar weaknesses.
Still there is a chance, not just on January first but every day…a new chance to see the world in a different light, a new opportunity become our own better angels, a chance to change our course ever so slightly toward the person we want to be.
May your New Year Shine Brighter Than All Those That Have Come Before and, I have to say it… God Bless Us, Every One.
Comments