Realities and Un-Truths

The new year has come and gone, and at five days old the fresh baby skin of 2011 is starting to harden in winter winds. After two and a half years as a Playwrights student, staying up until midnight has become the least remarkable part of New Year's Eve. And since that's kind of the point... NYE has become a little anti-climactic. Reality check: New Year's Rockin Eve, the big party of the year, mostly involves being packed into Times Square like sardines for hours on end in the cold with two people you know and a million you don't. Unless you're Ryan Seacrest or some band I probably haven't heard of, or of course dear Dick Clark, God bless him. 

The best part of both my NYE and NYD was the beach. First of all, I still can't really wrap my brain around being at the beach in December or January (or any month that isn't June, July, or August, really). Warmth, sun, sea, sand (I actually don't like sand), my family. LIGHT. Reflections, of many kinds. Seeing the last dawn of 2010 and the first dawn of 2011, reveling in the beauty of the ocean and the sky.

The new year continues to call up thoughts of this time last year. Travel tends to cause my family to watch the news more than we usually do, to catch weather and traffic reports in the morning before we head out for the day. Lately I've seen a lot of stories about skiing, which reminds me that J. is probably skiing with his dad right now. Sunny days, theme parks, and daily trips to the pool prove much more distracting than dreary car rides.

I mentioned before how one can be so solitary when with other people. Today I was driving in Georgia, through mostly-dead trees, brown grass, under cloudy skies and indecisive rain/spray from the combination of the wet highway and innumerable trucks. The road can be a cold companion, even with other people in the car. Lonely thoughts grew with each passing mile. The rain and fog left my field of vision softened to a small arena in front of my car. We passed through various rock stations. The Gater. The Eagle. The Hawk. I contemplated the connection between classic rock stations and aggressive animals. Our classic rock stations back home (three of them, because we're in a blue state) are The Drive, The Loop, and Jack FM. No animals. Hmm. I think I am falling in love, cyclically, with several of my past romantic interests. I have mixed feelings about this.

It's getting late, or I think so. I'm not really so sure what time it is anymore. The road does weird things like that to your brain, and to time itself. All I know is we have another 700 miles to go tomorrow, so I should get some sleep. More musings later.