"The year is dying in the night...."

From "The Case Against New Year's Eve," Simon Winchester's article in Saturday's WSJ:

New Year madness is a thing of quite modern making, and hardly an improvement on the tradition that long preceded it, which called for a somewhat sober, respectful and reflective morning celebration. I blame the Scots for the worldwide embrace of midnight debauchery. And, of course, whoever it was that, some little while beforehand, went and invented public clocks.

Clocks are the real key. The whole notion of bidding formal and raucous farewell to the Old and offering optimistic greeting to the New was something that could really only occur once we in the public square knew when the exact moment of midnight was. Until the manufacture of proper clock escapements, and until Galileo exhibited the marvels of the pendulum, the slow appearance of dawn just had to do. First light was the only clue anyone had as to the start of a new year.

And while we're on the subject of New Year's (and, by extension, most people's inclination to make resolutions), remember this early M-mv exhortation (from 2003):

Let's see. What else? Oh, yes. [Thursday] is New Year's Eve. Let me appeal to your petulant elitist side (as opposed to your lurking egalitarian side), and entreat you to make no "promises to self" that involve measuring your food or rearranging your bedroom to accommodate a large, ugly treadmill or other torture device. If rooms must be arranged, let it be to make way for more bookshelves or a roll-top desk with countless cubbies. Nordic Track, indeed. What, bosh. Walk to the bookstore or the library if you need to tone and firm. But invite ugliness into your home? Bleah. Never.

Avoid resolving to lose ten pounds, run two miles daily, and get up at 5 a.m. every day to accomplish it. These are resolutions built like Chevy Cavaliers and Nabisco Sugar Wafers (that is, not to last).

Similarly, avoid the dangerous slip-slide in self-pity and -recrimination that can be the thirty-six hours before January 1. (Hint: The slip-slide usually begins when you reluctantly switch from seasonal music, and in a desperate bid to find music to which you can relate, you put on a station or cd that violently jerks you back to your late teens and early twenties.) Folks, this is not where you want to be.

Stop the insanity!

Put on some jazz or classical. Relax with a cup of Trader Joe's French roast and a small slice of their New York cheesecake.

Ah, better.

Now.

If you must list and sort and promise, well, will these work?

(1) Resolve to read more, think more, write more, learn more.

(2) Subscribe to a magazine that opens new worlds to you. (No, Entertainment and People don't count.)

(3) Promise yourself more than twenty minutes daily to think, a space-time into which nothing and no one can creep without your express mental invitation. It is in this quiet zone that you will uncover your creativity.

(4) Begin a correspondence with someone who will share your reading discoveries.

(5) Keep a reading log, noting favorite passages.

These are resolutions built to last.