Year in Review - Dec 29 2022

 

Year in Review

Dec 29 2022

The end of the year

comes, as always

with its top ten lists,

winning photographs,

fearless predictions.

With solicitations

for causes good and bad,

during the season of giving

before the tax break ends.

With lots of earnest resolutions

you know won't be kept.

With the forced revelry

of New Years Eve,

when you'll over-drink

and drop your keys in the snow.

Jan 1,

which seems to come sooner every year.

Which will dawn as cold and bleak

as any midwinter day,

and hardly feels like the time

for a fresh new beginning.

Especially since nothing will change

in the coming year

except the date.

I know how cynical this sounds, how jaded.

After all, any excuse for a party,

and who couldn't use

a morale-booster once in awhile?

But after you've endured enough holiday seasons

   —   with all the excess

disappointed expectations

and pressure to get it right   —

things get old.

You'd rather stay home

and walk the dog.

Rather write a cheque

to the Sally Anne,

or surprise the panhandler

you usually pass

with a couple of crisp new 20s.

Rather ignore the year in review.

Because who wants to think back

to the famine and wars

fires and floods

and other atrocities

   —  that, I hasten to add

are still going on

despite the calendar.

And at midnight, when the ball drops

while you’re sitting in your easy chair

watching TV,

rather raise a glass

and make a toast

with a single malt Scotch

or fine Pinot Noir.

So as the crowd cheers

and the confetti falls

it's good riddance to the old.

And with narrowed eyes

and a skeptical brow

it's welcome in the new.

While digging down

and trying to kindle some hope.

Because who knows,

this may finally be the one

that lives up to all the promise.