one more new year

Someone had the brilliant idea to hold a concert in 20-degree weather on top of an ice rink. I was perfectly bundled in sweater tights and wool socks and long underwear and two sweatshirts and a knee-length down coat and armwarmers and a big scarf and a hat, in a manner similar to a toddler unable to bend at the waist after bundling. Every part of me was warm except my feet. Stupid ice rink. My boots are snow boots, allegedly good down to -32 Fahrenheit (which is something low in Celsius too, and that’s all I know). And did I forget to mention the sweater tights? And also the wool socks?

I still got frozen feet.

So then I went to warm myself by the warming station and my feet hadn’t even gotten unfrozen yet when some guy tapped me on the shoulder and said, “Your coat is smoking.” And lo, I had set myself on fire at knee level.

Fortunately, my coat didn’t burn through so much as it melted.

We left. If you can’t get warm without going up in flames, it is wise to leave. So we missed the dropping of the ball, a ball which appeared, from what I saw during the concert, to be suspended on a cable from a crane. Once again, my life is held together with duct tape (although in this case, an entire city’s life seems to be held together with duct tape. Improvisation, baby.).

J. turned off the light in A.’s apartment at 11:34 p.m., and I woke up from my dozing and protested, “It’s only 25 minutes to midnight! Can’t we stay up for 25 minutes?” but apparently they could not, so I brushed my teeth and read Breaking Dawn and wrote until my clock beeped 12:00 a.m., whereupon I said Happy New Year in the direction of J. and A., and J. groggily responded, and I was asleep by 12:03 or so.

I would complain of my own lameness were it not for two factors: first, both J. and A. are in college, and if college students can’t stay up until midnight, an elderly lawyer like me cannot be expected to do so. And second, who made up our current calendar and gave this day meaning, anyway? It seems so arbitrary that I can hardly mind missing the exact moment of year switching. It would have been one of my best New Year’s Eves even if I’d fallen asleep for good at 10:30.

Carry on.