New Year (2022)

[ENTRY 72..✍️]

Ah, at last. I've finally caught up to date. The signal was so bad (and still is) that I couldn't post the delayed entries in one go. Plus, there's a specific time where I could only connect to the internet and I'm usually asleep during that period.

Now I might be too late but let's talk about the "great" New Year and how mine went.

I slept for a few hours before the clock struck twelve and was woken up by my mom's embrace with a "Happy New Year" greeting. Although the whole fam was together, it wasn't that very splendid. Christmases and new years have just stopped being merry the moment we moved here in the city. I blame my parents for it. I probably sound so ungrateful but it's not like I'm not glad my family is alive and well. It's just, these events used to be so fun when I was a kid because in our hometown, everyone else was there. My cousins, friends, relatives… people I grew up with. And then we moved and it was just us. Though I love my family and all, it's just not the same. I've tasted utter bliss during these seasons so any joy the celebrations give me now that couldn't rival my childlike euphoric experience back then—makes these supposedly "special occasions'' regular. It seems I have a very high standard but I can't change it now. It's already there even before I knew what "standard" means.

People always seem livelier, though, during New Year as compared to Christmas. The entire neighbourhood was screaming with all sorts of noises despite the blackout. Firecrackers, cheers, car horns... It was really funny because a lot of people were on the streets banging kitchen utensils together. One group played soccer with the lid of a cooking pot instead of a ball along the road just outside our house. Motorbikes zooming past, deliberately making extra "vroom-vrooms" and people would cheer on as they'd pass as if they were in some sort of race. One rider tied some kind of string or rope at the back of his bike and at the end of it was another lid of a kitchen pot so it was really making a special kind of noise as it grazed against the road whilst being dragged 😂 

The sky, however, was so dark and gloomy. No fireworks this year to spice up the night.

Dad, the chef in the family, was here (he and mom stayed around for three days), so as usual, the dishes were sublime. We also had cake and leche flan. The day was absolutely more special than Christmas, but like I said, it was just regular.

I admit the excitement of a fresh year can be contagious, but as I grew older, I suddenly became not particularly ecstatic about this specific holiday. To me, New Year is only a reminder that another number will be added to everyone's age in the next revolution of the earth around the sun, rendering us older and our grandparents closer to death; if they aren't yet already…

Haha. I'm so positive, aren't I? Sorry. It's true, though. Time is vicious.

New Year's Resolution. Ha. I've long given up on that because I know myself. It's just like buying a new pretty notebook. The idea of a fresh start, fresh pages... thrills me. It's so new that I'm afraid to sabotage it with shitty penmanship so as much as I can, I try to make my handwriting immaculate. In the following pages, the same neatness and orderliness can be seen because the notebook still bears the precious value of a novel item. Overtime, the meticulous way of handling a pen becomes more relaxed. Perfection becomes mediocre. Passion replaced by minimal effort. Minimal effort becomes habitual. Mistakes carelessly scratched instead of concealing it with an eraser. Until eventually, I just stop caring whether or not my handwriting resembles the works of a storm.

This can be applied to almost anything, really. When something is fresh and new, we mostly only tend to take a great deal of care for it in the beginning. Just in the beginning. That's why I really have a mad respect to those who have mastered an abundance of self-discipline to stay resolved.

I do, however, have some ideas of the things I'll do this year; some noticeable changements, but I won't announce them just yet until those ideas turn to plans. By that, I mean when I've already combined my thoughts of the things I want to do, the determination of having these things achieved, and the actions in pursuit towards succeeding them. Because unless I'm already taking the steps and the initiative towards the road to these goals, then they're not plans yet. They're still ideas floating around my head. A bunch of promising words. And when they're just words, they're only mere fancies. Fickle and pliable to change. And I don't want to state premature plans only to dismiss them on a whim because when I share them, the more likely it is for me to dismiss them. Haha. This mostly only applies to big changes, though. (Cough, cough. "Getting out of your comfort zone" attempts.)

Truth is, I hate being determined to do something grand in the future and then disappoint myself later. So for my sake, I won't write them just yet. It'll just annoy me to find evidence of my ephemeral motivation only to find myself standing in the same place as before because my lackadaisical arse never moved to begin with.