“An optimist stays up until midnight to see the new year in. A pessimist stays up to make sure the old year leaves.” Bill Vaughn

In my youth, I stayed up to ring in the new year in every time zone.  I raised my glass of sparkling grape juice and blew my horn along with all the drunken fools on television.  When I was a little older, I continued the tradition with the younger children I watched, so their parents could join the revelry themselves.  Those were some of the best New Year's I think I had. 

The birth of a new year is steeped in tradition and superstition.  The Romans' held the month of January as sacred to Janus, for whom the month January was named. Janus was portrayed with two faces, one facing forward to the future and one looking back on the past.  He was a door keeper between the past and future.  Today we take this time to remember those events of the past year and ponder on them.  We rejoice in our accomplishments and mourn our losses.  It is a time of taking stock of our lives and preparing for the coming rebirth in Spring.

The tradition of Old Father Time with his sickle and hour glass passing on the torch to the youthful Baby New Year also has Ancient Rome to thank for it's association with our present day tradition.  The old and haggard Father Time is in fact Cronus, the father of Zeus.  Cronus is often depicted with a sickle since it is the weapon he used to dethrone his own father, Uranus (Father Sky and the base of the word universe).    Zeus, the youngest child of Cronus and Rhea, defeated his father after a long and bloody battle.  Since gods can not be destroyed, he banished him thus repeating the cycle of the youth defeating the aged.

And so it goes on today.  Birth... life...decline...death.  Youth overcomes and surpasses age.   The future leaps through the present on it's way into the past.  The cycle goes on.

In these first few days of the new year, I have two wishes for you.  May you look forward with joy and hope and backwards with understanding.  I also hope that when it comes time for our spirited youth to seize their day, we will witness a calmer transition than those of the old gods. That is to say, free from fighting, intrigue and banishment.

Happy New Year