A Day is Not a Year
Today is Monday. I have the day off. It is the last day of December, which is the last month of the year.
Tomorrow is Tuesday. I have the day off. It is the first day of January, which is the first month of the year.
But it’s still just 24 hours, just like today, just like yesterday, and March 23 and August 19 and June 15. It is not a whole new year, but another day in a chain of days that have been labeled conveniently by our calendar, and celebrated with fireworks, balldrops, champagne and kissing. (Hey, I’m all for champagne and kissing!)
The concept of a calendar is cultural and thus imprecise. As with many things, the Church took over the calendar and assigned days to various saints to honor them, to improve traffic into the confessional and pews, to corner the market on religion, and to curb the wantonness of some celebrations. That’s a fairly dim view of the Church… I really have nothing against it, or religion. If you accept the concept that we took a lunar calendar and tweaked it to base 12, plus or minus some minutes and days, then I have no problem with thinking about La Virgen de Guadalupe on Dec. 12, or St. David (Dewi Sant) on March 1.
The imprecision can be celebrated too – there’s always Leap Day and even Leap Second. (And of course, then you have the Jewish and Chinese calendars, and all those others…)
My problem comes with the idea that there is really some deep and everlasting significance to The Day, The Eve, the whatever. Not that I’m a cranky old Scrooge. Quite the opposite. Why confine our celebrating to just a handful of days in the year? I suppose banks must open, roads must be patched, trains and hospitals and police stations have to function…but in addition, why not have more special days?
In her wonderful book I’m In Charge Of Celebrations, Byrd Baylor writes about a young girl who celebrates special secret holidays – some solemn, some impromptu, others quite festive. The Time of Falling Stars, Dust Devil Day and others mark the wonderful, simple events in her life in the desert.
I too have those days. My calendar is littered with them. Some of them are about relationships, some represent beginnings, some endings. The day I decided to go to graduate school. The day I found $10 in a stack of old flower pots. The day I held a runover cat until he died, ushering him peacefully into the next life. The day of two Mondays (I was crossing timezones). The day I picked a rose in a Spanish abuela’s garden. My favorite holiday is what I call “National Going Back to Bed Day” which is usually the day after the Christmas break that the kids go back to school, and mom can take the day/morning off by going back to bed.
But the big days – the Best Christmas Ever, my son’s birth, my wedding day, graduation – they are still only 24 hours long, and they pass, minute by minute, second by second. As much as you wish them here already, and wish they would never end, they do end, and another day comes along. No matter who you are, you only get 24 hours a day.
Perhaps I have come to this concept of time because I work in a deadline-driven environment (editing/publishing). There IS such a thing as too late, and one day is often more important than the one before it or the one after it. But this is still a collective consciousness – a mass decision that the first of the month is when the presses will roll out a monthly paper. And these things can be changed with enough lead time and/or cash.
So today is the last business day of the year, and I have things to mail, calls to make, people to see. We also have some celebrating to do, movies to watch, little symbolic touches to prepare around the house to ring in the New Year. I even have stashed some noisemakers and confetti bombs to scare our dog ring in midnight.
If one gets caught up in the tangle of time, one can get very depressed that the days aren’t longer (the good ones longer, the bad ones shorter, that is). But because time just is, the good moments and bad days come as fast and as slow as the forgettable moments. And soon, too soon, you are in a bed somewhere, looking up at your children and grandchildren (if you can recognize them), proud and happy. A little sad. Tired.
I went through a depression back in the 80s. During that, I called a friend on New Year’s Eve, feebly reaching out to see if I could turn things inside out for an evening. It wasn’t too late (9:30), but she was already in bed. I asked, “Is it too late to call?” She snapped: “I’m trying to go to sleep early because I have to get up very early for my shift at the 24 hour Peace Prayer Vigil!!!” I rang off.
At La Leche League, during the crazy tumble of days with a newborn, I learned a phrase: “this too shall pass.” And it did. It has, and I wish those baby days back sometimes. But that would mean I miss out on today and the Wii tournament we’ve planned, the Pirates Stratego and the Texas Caviar I’m making.
As the wheel of 2007 rolls around to 2008, yes, pray for peace, countdown to the second and cheer, but don’t forget to live right now, this minute. It too shall pass.