A New Hope

"Yesterday, everybody smoked his last cigar,

took his last drink and swore his last oath.

Today, we are a pious and exemplary community.

Thirty days from now, we shall have cast our reformation to the winds 

and gone to cutting our ancient shortcomings

considerably shorter than ever." 

~Mark Twain

My New Year's eve started out troublesome at best. There I was, with my husband, at a new-to-us restaurant/bar for a 9:15 dinner reservation and some live music. We would ring in the new year with strangers and full bellies.

Our table wasn't ready when we arrived. Thirty minutes passed, and it still wasn't ready. An hour past our reservation time, we left. Hungry. Thirsty. Angry. With nowhere to go.

This was to be a big night for us. Both our teenaged sons had plans which involved spending the night away from home. We were alone. Celebrating together. We ended up, by pure luck, at a lovely Italian restaurant down the road. Martinis at 10:45. First course around 11 p.m. We locked lips a bit before midnight and then on into the new year. Do you know how hard that is to do? It made me realize how brief our kisses have become -- that we had to look at the clock twice to make sure we'd made our shared kiss the last thing we experienced in 2012 and the kick off to 2013. We drove home with full bellies and happy hearts.

On the drive home, the text messages began to buzz with Happy New Year greetings. They continued well past the west coast's turn of the new year. Facebook was buzzing, with everyone full of hope and excitement for the year ahead. The last message I received was at 5:09 a.m. from my older son: "I'm going to bed now. I'll be sleeping really late!" I'm sure it was his way of asking me not to disturb his sleep with a mid-morning phone call or text, asking when he'd be coming home.

The moment the new year begins is a beautiful thing, isn't it? You can actually feel the hope for new beginnings radiate. Pure excitement. Pure joy. True connections and love. I wish we could bottle the emotions and uncap them every single night at midnight. What a perfect world this would be if the hope we feel, as we close the door on the past and look forward to a bright future, would carry us through all 365 days of the coming year.

Happy 2013.