Remember when New Year's Eve was fun?

Maybe it's just me, but I truly do not enjoy New Year's Eve anymore. I don't know what happened, exactly. I used to like it. Back in high school, and perhaps the first year or two of college, I threw an annual New Year's Eve party. All of my friends (and their friends) had a standing invitation to the party, and we always had a good time. Or at least that's how I remember it. Perhaps I'm editing memory here, but I like the idea of thinking that everyone had a good time at my parties.

At some point, I outgrew the parties... and some of the friends, too... and they outgrew me. I remember the first year that my party plans were threatened by a severe lack of guests. It seems that one of my guests planned her own party. The guest list was divided, and loyalties were challenged. It was messy. But if I recall correctly, that year proved to be my biggest and best New Year's Eve party. Some 40 people showed up (invited and uninvited), an impromptu dance floor was created, and several people stuck around until the wee hours of the morning. (I have the whole thing documented on several hours worth of video tape.)

It was my best New Year's Eve party, and also my last. To everything, there is a season, I suppose.

After that, there was a series of interesting New Year's Eves: a Barenaked Ladies concert, a completely spontaneous crashing of a party at the house of an old high school friend (that was 99-00, and I wound up having a really good time), and following that, the year that all of my friends were invited to their friends' parties. (That was the first year that I spent at home, alone, with the clock covered, because I couldn't stand the idea of ringing in the new year by myself.)

For the next two years, some friends and I went to parties at bars we used to frequent. Expensive, loud, hot. Crowded with drunk people I didn't know and didn't like. Not worth my time or my money.

This year I'm going to New York, to be with my friends and their friends. We've rented a limo to take us to a hibachi restaurant/club for dinner, drinking and dancing. A bit on the pricy side, I guess, but it sounds like a really good time. I'm looking forward to it, not because it's New Year's Eve, but because I get to spend time with people I like.

It's not that I hate New Year's Eve... I just don't like how people make such a huge deal out of it (and every other holiday we celebrate).

Okay, I'm venting again. And damnit, I'm not even finished. I really wanted to tackle the whole New Year's resolution thing. Ah, another post for another time.