A New Year of New Possibilities

By Jim Doyle

Now that we’re finally out of that Bah Humbug mode, I’m ready for a REAL celebration.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m all for the idea behind Christmas, peace on earth, good will towards men and all that. But how could you not love New Year’s? Booze, parties, good will towards women and vice versa, loud music, funny hats, black-eyed peas at midnight with your scrambled eggs (when would you EVER eat that combination?), steely-eyed resolve to (a) lose weight, (b) quit smoking, or some equally unlikely self-improvement exercise. Now THAT’s a holiday.

Of course, by the time you read this, we will be well into 2009, eight years after we thought we’d be on our way to Jupiter to find the black monolith, 25 years after Aldous Huxley told us we’d be one world ruled by the thought police, nine years after people with funny hats living in fallout shelters told us our computers would crash and we’d be eating grass for months, three years before the end of the world according to the Aztecs (or was it the Mayans? Who invented tequila? Never mind).

So, how are those New Year’s resolutions coming? I decided, way back in 2008 on my birthday while writing this column, that I would make a dramatic resolution for this year, something new and different, not your father’s resolution. Something in the same category as weight loss or smoking cessation, but more likely to be achieved during the course of the year. After a lot of thought, I finally found it.

Drum roll, please. . .

I will grow hair in 2009. On my head. Nose and ears don’t count.

Resolutions reflect the meaning of the holiday for most civilizations, which associate the turn of whatever calendar they used as a benchmark for new things, makeovers, if you will. It is the oldest of all holidays, beginning with the Babylonians, who also began the practice of resolutions. Their most popular one was the return of borrowed farm equipment. Ah, you gotta admire those pesky Babylonians. The Jewish tradition marks the year with Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, which requires mankind to repent its sins for ten days in preparation for a new start, cleansed of the detritus of the old.

I am spending my New Year’s with my son Stratton, a musical star of no small talent. He is proud of the fact that he has been playing in bars since he was 17, when Jay Ecker snatched him into Rikenjak’s on jazz night. Stratton’s primary instrument is the saxophone, and many of you will have heard him play at some point in those seven years. He now performs all over the country and beyond with Hamilton Loomis, a Houston star who does a combo blues-funk kind of rhythm. Their New Year’s is at the Crystal Ballroom in downtown Houston.

One of the songs they will play has become a favorite of mine since Stratton picked up the keyboards and amplified his singing prowess in pursuit of his artistic vision. It’s called “I Wanna be a Better Man.” What better theme music could there be for a New Year’s celebration?

The human condition is a ceaseless search for renewal, redemption, and occasionally romance. The world is an awesome place to conduct that search, full, as it is, of the possibility of something new around every corner. The winding down of one year, with what seems like ceaseless holidays, grinds to a halt as the new dawn of possibility approaches. “A New You,” as the sign says in the beauty shop.

My favorite mother-in-law, Liz Linam, once told me that life is like a roll of toilet paper. The closer it gets to the end, the faster it goes.

Let’s see; now we have Twelfth Night, the MLK Holiday, Inauguration Day, multiple Mardi Gras balls, Fat Tuesday; Spring Break, Easter, Memorial Day; summer; and so it goes. Sounds like the roll is going pretty fast already.

I promise I will do my best to grow hair and be a better man. I wish all of you  great luck, Dear Readers, in pursuing your goals and resolutions, whatever they may be.