Happy New Year

Annie and I started 2021 just like we’ve started most days recently: I got up a few minutes before 6:00 AM, although she’d be happy if it were an hour earlier. Some days she has tried to encourage me by just barely touching her small, damp nose to mine. Occasionally she will try licking my hair. Once recently she took a mouthful of it and gave a tug. Then I absolutely refuse to get up for at least a half an hour. Once I give in, I know she’d work the kitty alarm so that we’d be getting up at 4 o’clock. I have to hold my ground sometimes.

In any case, I get up, pee and wash my hands with her meowing at my feet. I grind coffee and get the pot started. She meows. I get her bowl, put her 1/3 cup of kitty chow in it and try to put it down, without being tripped while she weaves between my legs. She eats; I sit with my coffee and read, meditate, or write; Grant sleeps for another hour. A peaceful start to the morning and this new year.

Last night, the fireworks started at 5:00. Grant put the finishing touches on the dinner he made from fancy tinned seafood and olives he ordered, plus Swiss chard and eggplants from our garden. As we reminisced about eating tapas and drinking vermouth in Madrid, the fireworks continued. We moved on to reviewing 2020, which, being sheltered in our new house after spending two months with grandbabies in Okinawa, was a pretty good year. We are such lucky people.

Grant took a nap, I watched the Great British Baking Show: Holiday Edition. I had turned on the usual New Year’s Eve TV galas. With no crazy crowds, they were too sad to see. More fireworks from houses on our street, across the canal, over by the lakes. Occasionally there was a lull of a couple of minutes, but then they started again. Grant got up. We had a toast of champagne and shared a mint chocolate chip cookie from Gideon’s Bakery. To bed about 10:00, fireworks booming away.

Temperature about 75°, I left the bedroom door open. We did not see the ball drop in Time Square, but we did know when 2021 arrived in Windermere: we were awakened as the fireworks went wild, on and on and on. Finale of all finales. Finally, at 1:00 AM, it was quiet. Was this a typical New Year’s Eve, or were people just so glad to see the end of 2020? I can’t imagine how many thousands of dollars were spent, likely in the hundreds. Certainly more than for the Fourth of July.

Now it just before dawn. I hear a cardinal and a squirrel. Soon the titmouse and wrens will start. Annie has joined Grant for a quick nap. Happy New Year indeed.

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