Monday, January 01, 2007

What New Years Eve do you most remember?

When I lived in a commune in Boston with the man I once thought I would spend the rest of my life with, I'd flown home to have a few holiday days with my parents in the Carolinas. My flight back was on New Years Eve, due to arrive well before ten thirty and from there I would take a taxi to Brighton, on the other side of the city. The plane was running late, but I picked up a bottle of champagne at the airport when we landed, stashed it in my bag and shared a cab with another woman headed in the same direction.

Already the night was lit up with firecrackers, the streets filled with people rushing in groups to god only knows where to bring in the new year. By the time we were parallel with the Boston Commons the crowds spilled out into the street and traffic was at a standstill. I looked at my watch. R was expecting me by now and it was already 11 30. When we hadn't moved more than a block in the next twenty minutes, I told the cabbie to open the trunk. I pulled out the bottle of champagne and as the countdown, that magical 10...9...8...sounded out all around us, I popped the cork and the other woman, the cabbie and I guzzled our toast from the bottle. For a moment, we were caught in a time freeze...the moon so high in the Boston sky it floated like a pregnant woman on the smoke drifting up from the fireworks.

Finally, traffic started moving again. A half hour later I was hurrying up the steps to the commune, bag thumping on the stairs behind me in one hand, half-bottle of champagne in the other, my love at the door, warming me with his kiss, the sweet taste of champagne still on my lips christening him with smoke, moonlight, fresh dreams and our own rush into a new tomorrow.


Happy 2007!

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

Since ny nephew was born in 1996 Dec 31, it is celebrated with much funfare. It is a double whammy for all of us.

Wish you a very happy new year 2007.

Pris said...

A New Year's Baby! What a special memory.

Happy 2007 to you, too!

polona said...

happy new year, pris! best wishes to you and yours!

i can't think of any memorable new years eve... perhaps it's my attitude. to me, new years (just like birthdays) are just a day as any other... some figures may change but other than that all's the same...

Pris said...

Hi Polona
As time goes on, the day stands out less for me, but not in earler years. There was just something exciting in seeing the new year come in (even if I wasn't awake at the actual crossover time:-)

tom said...

i remember one from the early 80's when we had to leave a restaurant before midnight and we pulled our cars into a rest area on I-94 and got out to celebrate. then hopped back into the cars and drove home


happy new year, pris

Anonymous said...

The one which jumps out is the one where I went back to work the night at the guest house which had been my first home away from home and full time job. I had left some months earlier but that night I was filling in to help and it was fun there. But what actually I recall is waking in one of the bedrooms the following morning to the smell of smoke. Some idiot had left a towel over a shaving light. As it was all worked out well in the end and there was little more than minor damage. But the memory lingers......

Anonymous said...

Happy new year ... Happy everything!!

Pris said...

I think I'd remember that one, too. Yikes!

Joyce Ellen Davis said...

Sounds like a movie script! Happy New Year, Pris!

Joyce Ellen Davis said...

Oh yes. We're not really party people, usually stay home and watch everybody else around the world do it right. When my kids were little, we always ate the gingerbread house we made before CHristmas, went outside at midnight and banged pots and pans and honked the car horn. Last night I watched Garrison Keillor (a good way to celebrate New Year's Eve!).

Pris said...

pepe, it felt like that...and gingerbread houses. Yum!

Anonymous said...

The exact year eludes me now -- I want to say 1973 or 1974, something like that -- it was a wild hippie party in Minneapolis at the house of some people I knew. I mostly remember lots of music, lots of people in the house, lots of wild rambling conversation, and lots of... atmosphere.

That's as much as I'm going to say about it here. ;~)

Pris said...

Hi Lyle
My imagination can fill in the blanks:-)