Happy New Year!

Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
and the oaks are just too greedy
we matter more than you can never buy me;
taking me back to health.
--MegaHAL

So, after deciding that I would go out and do something on New Year's Eve, and then deciding to instead stay at home sulking and being miserable, I changed my mind one more time. Though I was a bit tired and headachy still, I decided that if I could walk all the way to the second-closest Metro station to my home, then I could go to a gathering for the new year. So I did. It was certainly more entertaining than the housemates' party I'd attempted to join in last year. (I would have said it was interesting, but "interesting" was everyone else's word. My word was "fluffy." This may be because while everyone else was getting Reiki'd, I was getting some much-needed quality time with some cats.)

All is quiet on new year's eve. Hail the calendar! As if

clocks will pause for a wise man.

If what you do on New Year's Day prefigures the year to come, then this year should find me feeling tired but not utterly wrecked, reading interesting books and poetry, getting a good nap or two, eating chocolate, and occasionally interacting with people who for reasons of their own refer to me as "normal." Not too bad. The year's first stressful conversation got to wait till a few minutes after midnight on January 2, so that could be worse.

For want of a dreamer's bed
is not where you must descend,
towards your worst fear

i have landed on the subway and i am that weapon
i won't stop and stare and stare and window-shop,
and tried what she could,
as good as theirs
i am no carpenter. I built
their two cents worth of longing for some notions of new year's day,
until they made themselves a part
of the opening.

Out of curiosity: If eating leafy green vegetables on January 1 represents dollar bills, and black-eyed peas represent coins, does eating canned spinach and canned legumes mean you will be getting canned money throughout the year? And if you add hot sauce, does that mean you will be getting hot money? Or does it just mean that your acquisition of riches will be a mildly painful but ultimately pleasurable process?

Silly superstitions really aren't made to be overthought like this, are they?

Eh well, I have no coherent thoughts left now. More later when I will, with any luck, have gotten something resembling a good night's sleep.

Lately, the weather aches;
the freshness of the hypotenuse.
with silver bells and tambourine,
i took my human fantasy
i shall remember your voice
is a small world after all
just to make noises in a chrysanthemum bed,
and days of auld lang syne?