There is about a quarter of an hour left in 2013 here in Mid Kansas, and I'm trying to figure out why I don't yield to the temptation to go ahead and "turn into a pumpkin" earlier rather than later. Everyone else has posted their "Happy New Year's" greetings on facebook, but I haven't. It all seems rather anticlimactic.
So, what's new about that? I've always been apathetic about this celebration thing; especially after an experience when I was perhaps 11 or 12. I was visiting a farm that New Year's Eve with my mother. One of my brothers family lived there with his parents-in-law and his new family, and we had come to help after the birth of a baby (can't rightly recall which child that was).
Midnight was approaching, and I got Mom to allow me to step out the back door and fire off a shot gun -- "Only once." Any more was wasteful. At the stroke of 12:00 AM, I stepped out, pointed the shotgun up and away from anything that might be damaged, and I pulled the trigger.
I can tell you that I was not prepared for my reaction. It was more like, "MEH" than not. I thought, Why in the world would anyone get excited about one more midnight? Why would I celebrate any passing day more than any other? Why should I wait for some artificial time to wish others well in their future? Isn't every day; every moment; the start of a whole "new year?" Shouldn't each moment of my life be lived in that expectation? Shouldn't I wish everyone a happy future at every moment of every new beginning?
And so, I try to live in that attitude.
It isn't easy for me to do, since I am an Adult A.D.D. person. Not every moment of my life is serendipitous. There are depressing times (although I don't suffer from chronic depression), just because things don't always go well and as an A.D.D. I am prone in the moment to exaggerate the importance of a coffee spill or a trip over a kitchen rug. In those times it's not uncommon; rather it is quite common for me to blurt out some epithet at the rug or at myself or at whatever has interrupted my calm of the moment.
In those moments it is precisely because, like Moses, "I am a man of unclean lips" that I often feel unworthy to even pray to God for strength. Still, I suck it up and pray. Sometimes the prayer is an epithet. Sometimes it is a simple confession, "Lord, it hurts!" Sometimes, depending on other health concerns of the day(s), it takes several days before I can return to an "even keel" and regain control, but my experience has always been that during my darkest hours, that's when I feel God's presence the more; when I feel the assurance that things will be better in the new times coming.
In that spirit, I wish you all a happy new year; for every day of every year, and I invite you to join me in mine.
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