Ten, two prior to the shift from one year to another.
Should I feel excited mentally and frantically about this repeated alteration? Yes, I should, I should be so. I should feel embraced by the sparkling spirits of the crowd countdown. I should feel overwhelmed with elation considering this major event that has breathed nostalgic and resolute life into those adorned, self-centered status updates on social networks. I should empathise with those pumping hearts that processes extraneous flows of blood cells to heat up the ardent ambience of the New Year's Eve.
Surprisingly, I do not.
Indeed it may not be a stupefying case to me. A teenager, whose genuine aspirations foremost are jettisoned by his ill-mannered society, in whom friends and family do not whole-heartedly confide, in fact can mind no better than the wintry gelidity that lacerates his unsecured skin. He has a flourishing mind, yet accompanied by a tender heart; he is open to sympathy with the motley destinies, on the other hand susceptible to the thrusts of vulgarity that the environment impinges upon him.
Should I feel sad? No. Honestly I feel cocooned among my cohorts that probably run in to the similar problem as I am. New year, not as much of a big deal, because all that change is the number of the year. Add the old one with one, and basically continue with the old traditions. New year, perhaps, but not new me.
I wonder what the feelings those stimulated souls have that it has such an effect on their actions on this monotonous day. How could a man drags himself out of his house, out of his warm shelter, out of his serene stability into a populated locust of cacophony and shrieks and jostling and stomping - a pervaded assault of jarring and jarred men. And what they get in exchange for the propulsion and resistance extends to merely a 15-minute view of colorful bonfires that will be broadcast on TV anyway, and if you miss, wait for a year - not much will have changed since then. So, why bother?
On this day last year a film struck me with its novelty. A marvellous line-up, a different perceptive, a good song, all of those has contributed to the success of New Year's Eve. There were reporters who innocently work their hearts out to manage the so-called biggest moment of the year. There were soldiers who still have their missions lingered on to eternity and cannot spend their supposedly congregation with their beloved. There were rejoicing-looking, genial singers and actors whose faces never seem to wizen decrepit, yet under those put-on masks are heapt hatred, neglected familial predicaments, inbred self-consciousness, all agglomerated and extraordinarily repressed so that the joviality and artistry can bulge. They carry huge sacks of responsibility, yet rekindle a tiny flame of hope. Hope for success, for reunion, or for unfulfilled dreams.
Then wondered I, is there nothing about the New Year's Eve apart from being nonsensically theatrical? Gazing at the far lights at the horizons, I get the hang of the answer. A fresh start it is, a big dream of entire, absolute change from the wearisome previous months. We always look forward to an answer - an answer to the question of what we are, what we deserve, and what we have to do to get our rewards. We leave no stone unturned in our attempts to hope, hope wildly, hope mildly - the hope that will possibly lead us to nowhere at all. Yet we believe in something we should have, because in the long run it might appear, in the long run God may respond to us in kind, in the long run the longed-for answers are fully replied with our own satisfaction.
Like the chemical mixture that awaits its outburst for such a long time of suppression to become magnificent fireworks of all shapes and sizes, our dreams fly high, our feelings explode, our souls set free upon the clocks ticking down to zero. We have wishes - those wishes for ultimate happiness drive us forward in the pursuit of completion and belonging - and those wishes are to be released, magically and enchantingly projected to the grandiose sky full of stars. For a moment that shall pass, briefly our hopes are able to find a solution, to at least sense its beacon lights after a long time of crooked turnings and tripping over splinters.
As I draw on to the conclusion of my lessons, 2016 has approached. 2015 is by no means a terrible turnout - I have at least fulfilled parts of my dreams, and my decisions bring me to the pleasantly tranquil postion I am today. There are resolutions to be completed, and if 2016 cannot pass them all, the following years will. In a moment of mixed joy and hope, I wish all's 2016 to be resonating with moments of true happiness and uplifting mood. Hopefully 2016 will take us farther than what the comely 2015 has taken us to.
"We'll take a cup of kindness yet,
For Auld Lang Syne."
