New Year and All That

Property of Stormberry.

Are you a New Year enthusiast? No? Well, a lot of people are not. I am, before you ask me, for many reasons, which I'll tale you about in this post. A lot of people are often excited about the New Year because it means parties and usually some of the best parties of the year. I still remember some of my most memorable New Years, spent with friends, or with family or even alone. I remember a bitter sweet one too, spent in Paris - my first time in Paris - and though then I wasn't feeling very happy towards the end, as I remember it, that was also an amazing New Year. (That's also when I realize how super nice French people can be when you make the effort to speak in French.)

However, yes, a lot of people get grumpy about the New Year, specially in pandemic-laced times like the ones we are living right now, and hurl things at the rest like "New Year is just another day", and "nothing will magically get better just because of it", or "it's not even a real New Year because there is a distortion that can't be corrected with the Skip-Year". Yes, I move in strange circles sometimes, but hey, I'm a witch, and I have learned that I tend to attract the weird.

So, the answer your questions, those are all either partially true statements or... not even that important. The point is that they are beyond the point. I mean, if New Year is just another day, hey, so are Saturday and Sunday, and yet we call them "weekend", and have "weekend plans" and all that. And what about Holidays? And no, nothing will "magically get better"... if you don't believe in magic, and if you do, congratulations! Then you know that you are the one who does the magic and the time of the year can give you the push to work the magic and make things better. Oh, and magic (or magick), isn't easy-peasy either. Any witch worth his or her salt would tell you that magic takes a lot of work, a lot of research, a lot of concentration and loads and loads of practice. So yes, actually this can "magickally get better", with all it entails.

Now, you can have your reasons for loving or liking or looking forward to the New Year, and I would love if very much if you decided to share them. Here, I will give you some of my own, and also some of my thoughts on the matter... because, you know (not so) daily thoughts and random ideas. :-)

This post will look somewhat different from all my other posts, and I know that because I put in the "topics" I would like to touch on before hand. I'm trying a new thing here, so bear with me. :-)

Get a New Planner

Property of Stormberry

Ok, I use a filofax and I do bullet journal now, but still, getting a new planner is an experience I love so, so much! I'm totally in love with my A5 Ochre Filofax Malden, and I doubt I'll ever change it... unless it falls apart, which I hope it doesn't. Still, I love looking at the options and sometimes I imagine getting a Filofax Malden in Pear (also in A5) because I really, really, REALLY love green, and since I moved from Personal size to A5 thanks to my lovely friend Tina, I think I'll also stay with this size... even if the planner doesn't fit in my smaller bags. I think I've found that elusive sweetspot known as Planner Peace. Was it planner-peace or planner-heaven?

Anyway, this is part of my New Year excitement. I'm not one to sit down monthly or weekly to draw up calendars and do all that shebang, but I do the whole year at once, and so, the New Year and days around it are perfect for that. I make my calendars, plan my trackers, decide what stays, what goes, select some "themes" when I want to, and along with my resolutions, I decide which subjects I would like to pay more attention to. For instance, one of my resolutions for this year is to blog more (aren't you happy about that?), and so, I decided to make a sort of tracker for posts. A simple one, mind you, just marking on a grid whether I posted or not.

On top of that, I also use (since 2012, I believe) a Witches Datebook by Llewellyn, which helps me with my witchy practice, and has a lot of stuff I find quite interesting. I'm linking you here the Datebook I'm currently using, at the site of Llewellyn, but normally I buy mine at Amazon.com. AND with my Witches Datebook, I also buy a Witches Calendar, also my Llewellyn. They go together so well, and though you can use only one, using them together makes perfect sense. I have tried to buy other things, specially a Herbal Almanac (I've been years into trying to tap my more herbal side, even though I'm really awful at gardening), but I just don't have the time to read and peruse so many stuff. Maybe some other year. Maybe I'll make that a resolution sometime. Who knows, right? :-D

I'm also much into calendars, and I like to have them almost in every single wall, specially because many have really pretty pictures. Or so I search them so. So I spend time around the end of the year and beginning of it, looking for pretty calendars. I usually go for calendars related to Art Nouveau, coffee, or maybe something that interests me in the moment. I'm not so much into calendars of dogs or cats or cars or nature. So that's also an exciting process.

Now, because we live in a social world where years are measured in a certain way, calendars are more often than not, also offered specially in certain times of the year. So is with datebooks, planners and such. So, if you are into calendars, this is the time when you can get them. This is also the time when many stores and organizations also gift planners and calendars. Isn't that exciting? If you are not much into calendars because... whatever reason, maybe one day you may like to try finding one you like. There are so many options! Millions and millions of themes, pictures, photographs, artistic, funny, nature related, architecture... pretty much, whatever strikes your fancy. And not only about the pictures, you can also find calendars that focus on the phases of the Moon, or full of astrological or astronomical data, or with space for planning (bigger squares or lines), even calendars for families (for each day you have a number of columns, usually five, for the plans of each family member), which can be used to keep track of multiple things, like family-work-studies, or to track events in social media, and real life.

And this is the time to get them. Would you miss out on the fun?

New Plans Too

With a New Year, certain new plans must be made. In Costa Rica (where I currently live), school usually starts in February or sometimes in January. This is because back in the day, when coffee production was huge here, all able hands were needed for the harvest, which happens (depending on the area) usually around November, December and January too. In some places it can start as early as October also, for what I heard. So, traditionally, children went to the coffee plantation with the parents to help them with the harvest. As it was desirable that the children were sent to school also, the school year was moved around it, and it stayed that way. So, as result, with the begining of the year, we start also a new chapter of learning. Further education programs and so, often also follow this yearly cycle, so the new year is presents also a chance for people to enroll into a school or a program to further their education, and these are part of the new plans you can make, at anytime, but in the New Year, you might be more aware of them or even feel more motivated to take a new path.

Our society works also in cycles determined by the year: businesses and entertainment places launch their new yearly programs and even fashion has new seasons. A new year can set a new theme, a new purpose, a new plan. This is when the new calendar events are presented, and if you are into it, this is when you can check for your expected book launches (I already have one I'm waiting for on April 20th), or concerts, seminars, movies and what-have-you. This is when you can pencil it in your calendar and plan to save for it.

As a witch, the New Year also means planning for a new round of Sabbaths, which in my case also means to make sure I have enough mead, because, hey, I'm that kind of a witch. :-) But you don't have to be a witch to have fun with the New Year (though it helps, honestly), because this is also when you can check your calendar and see when are those blessed long weekends and you can start planning on the trips you can make. And what now when travelling is being restricted due to the pandemic? Well, you can still make plans! The New Year and all it's happy, excited, dreamy energy is perfect to come up with creative new ways to make things amazing. Remember, when there's a will, there's a way.

The idea of cycles can have a powerful effect on people. For once, instead of feeling like you are drowning in a constant of days over which you have no power, facing things that are bigger than yourself, when you are able to chop up the time continuum into easy year-sized bits, you actually get a better sense of control. You can measure what you have achieved, how long have you gone, and you also get the feeling that you can correct what you did wrong. It doesn't matter that you make resolutions you then don't keep, what matters is the learning process. If you want to keep your resolutions, hey, work on adapting them. If you don't keep them, but don't care because the fun is just in making them and then see if they come to pass by themselves, have fun then!

You know how many of my 2020 resolutions I have achieved? Less than a half. And do I worry? Oh Hell no! That way I alreay have half a list of resolutions to recycle! Gara see the good side of it, right? By the way, one of my resolutions for 2020 was to relearn to play piano, which would have had happened if I had a piano, which I would have had if I my house would havee been finished in time, and I would have not been a victim of bank fraud and would have not lost my money. The resolution is still a valid one, and though the moving into my home is very, very near, buying my piano might take some time, but I don't worry. That's a dream for the future. I'll just listen to Fleetwood Mac albums in the meantime.

The Seasons

Though we have two or four seasons (depends on where you live), a New Year gives you a chance to have a new experience with each of them. There are places like Central America (and I believe most of the places in the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn), where the seasons look pretty much the same, and we often have all the fruits and veggies in all seasons. Still, each season has its own delights and there are some fruits and veggies or some celebrations that happen only on certain seasons. We have also high season and low season, and again, though the current pandemic situation might make it hard for us to visit other countries or beaches and mountains, there is always something around to enjoy. Blooming of trees and flowers in the garden, or our plants in pots, the way the Sun lights the sky at certain angles, the scents in the air, the sound of the rain that's so particular to each time of the year, the heat, the cold, and the chances it brings to wear this or that outfit. Even at home! Come on, you know you can make this fun!

In today's Occidental society, we don't use to celebrate the seasons, and though small groups of people might choose to celebrate the seasons, or you do it individually, the collective, global effort is centered into the one night of the year. Besides, if we had a day marked for celebrating the changing of each season, naysayers would have four more chances to bitch about it. Once is enought, I would say. Yet still, in order to experience a given season again, a whole year has to pass, and so, celebrating a New Year also means that we will again have the seasons, and the chance to live them, maybe even better than the last time.

Anyway, as nearly the whole planet celebrate the New Year the same day, I believe that all that festive and happy energy tend to go around the globe and make someting super-positive for all of us. We all feed on this awesome energy of hopes, and dreams and new beginings. Yes, there are people who get depressed, that happens too, and also with Christmas, and so on, but there is also a lot of this amazing energy floating around, and if you want and can, why not take advantage of it and ride the wave of hopes and celebration?

You know, maybe this year, just like the last, will be hard in this regard, and we won't be able to travel and go out all we want, but that means also less conmuting time and more time for calm and for planning new, cool ways to do something fun. It's maybe time to learn to be comfortable with ourselves, inside, without looking for the external excitement. Instead of going out and looking for fun and inspiration, how about you invite it in? Maybe then, when we can go outside again, freely, we could also bear gifts for the world. Don't you think?

The Social Thing

Though it might be arbitrary, a year has ended and another has began, and so we measure with it not only time, but also things measured with time: years of life, years in a relationship, years of experience. In the end, though we are individuals, we live in society, and even if there are many things that need improving and changing (I'm not going there now), we are also part of this rhythm. The years pass, and we have again and again the chance to push forward. In this period, peppered with seasons and landmarks and celebrations and holidays, and days of remembrance of milestones of the history, year after year we get the chance to work on our projects, make something of them.

A number of years pass in order to elect our leaders, in countries where there are (working) democratic governments, and in the years in between, we can evaluate how they manage the power they have been given.

Years also mark the time for bonuses, in those jobs where such premiums are given, or also mark the time were an extra monthly payment is given - such as in Costa Rica, where in December we are paid double - but years also mark special offer times, like the Black Friday, for instance, or the January sales.

In the end, a lot of things in the social life are arbitrary, but are conventions that end up marking the life around us. The sense of time and the lotting up of it, in the end, define much of what we make and how we do it. Years are instrumental to define when you start school, when you become of legal age, when you can retire (in countries where there are provisons for that), and so, why not celebrate it?

Go on, celebrate it and make the most of it, and have a happy 2021!