Everybody and their dog was just at my house, sitting on my couches, playing hockey on my pond, talking to my family, and playing games in my bedroom. It was nice of every single person I know to visit all of a sudden. It was also nice of them to leave their dogs outside. It gets quite loud enough in here with just a hundred people and all their millions of little siblings.
Just now, however, it is very quiet in the Lawrenson household. The mountain of hostess gifts is sitting quietly on the table. The mountain of lost and found is waiting forlornly in the entrance, forsaken by its various partying owners. The big, muddy lake by the door - that was mopped up after everyone fished their skates out of it and left, almost twenty-four hours ago.
Guys, its New Year's Eve. It seems like just yesterday was 2018's New Year's Party, and yet, can you believe that this year began with the Olympics? It's been less than twelve months since snowboarding!
I am home alone. When that coincides with the last day of the year I usually choose to wax eloquent in my diary. Here, for your enjoyment, are my thoughts on the occasion.
December 31st, 2018
I am for the second time in my life approaching the end of one year and the beginning of the next with exhaustion and oblivion being the key markers of my mental state. I always look forward to the coming twelve-month, wondering what all will happen in it.
I will be nineteen. There are zero disadvantages to being nineteen. Nineteen-year-olds have everything going for them and nothing to go wrong - except, of course, if nothing were to go at all, everyone were to marry somebody else, no accomplishments or connections were to be made, and all the delicious nineteen-year-old time were to be frittered away. But there is hardly any danger of that, is there? Of course, 2019 could bring on WWIII, but even that would be a fine time to be alive. All the best war stories are about nineteen-year-olds anyway.
I can't believe I will actually be nineteen. I used to imagine I was sixteen, but only other people - tall, handsome, beautiful, charming people - were nineteen. What an idea! The first paragraph of my eulogy completed. Over. Done. No edits can be made to that part of the story.
I feel as though the only response to an ancient teenager like me is "Oh, you just wait." I can't wait! Life is going to get so exciting I won't see half of it if I had forty eyeses. I know I need to cherish every minute of these happy, golden years. The years when there are so many DSLRs running around the house that sentimental memories are effortless. The years when even if I drag my heels life is a whirl of gaiety.
I am not about to do any dragging of heels going into the new year. I hope to start off 2019 healthy, happy, hopeful and any other positive H-words you can think of.