A fresh start

The glow of Christmas tree lights to welcome us home.

I rather like New Year.

After the excitment of Christmas and the car crash of family birthdays, I start the New Year feeling optimistic and fired up for a fresh start.

I always have the best of intentions, renewing evergreen resolutions about eating less and exercising more, spending less and earning more, and sorting the house out by cleaning up and clearing out.

It doesn’t matter that my resolutions often fall by the wayside well before the end of January – right now, I can happily proceed as if they’ll last all year long.

We spent New Year’s Eve in familiar fashion, staying with friends along with a group of families we have known for more years than I care to mention. We catch up on each other’s lives, eat far too much fabulous food, toast the New Year and take bets on whether I’ll manage to be still awake at midnight. This year I did! Hurrah! Although I didn’t make it much past midnight, mind you.

The New Year got off to a good start, dosed up with fresh air and a liberal coating of mud after tramping around the lake in the middle of Wanstead Park.

Now I’d like to get my hearing back. I ended up with an ear infection on the back of a pre-Christmas cold, so staggered through the festive season dosed up on antibiotics and horse-pill sized painkillers, fulfilling the role of the elderly relative saying “What? What?” every time anyone tried to penetrate my deafness.

So aside from hoping to hear again, I think my main New Year’s Resolution is to be grateful for what I’ve got, and make the most of it. I’d like to carve out more time doing the things I enjoy, whether indoors or outdoors, and less time in front of one form of screen or another.

So here’s to health and happiness for 2016!