New Year's Eve

Post date: Dec 31, 2011 9:10:2 AM

It is hard for me to separate NYE from the birthday which is hardly a surprise given that in my lifetime they have always occurred together!

Today is the day that Samoa has changed its calendar to make sure it is now the first country in the world to see the sun. The lengths you have to go to achieve that are quite amazing and if I sometimes grumble about sharing my birthday with NYE it's nothing compared to any Samoan person who was born on 30 December and totally lost their birthday for 2011! These people will share an experience of the people who have a birthday on 29 February in any non leap year. Hard too on the Seventh Day Adventists and Jews in Samoa who lost the sabbath this week. I think there are more of the former than the latter. Might have much more significance long term especially as the most orthodox of the Adventists are concerned that they will never again be celebrating sabbath on the right day.

Is there a right day to celebrate things? Certainly hard to imagine celebrating Christmas on any day but 25th Dec and yet people do early and late Christmas' to make sure they get time with all family members. Would we celebrate NYE on any day except 31 Dec? Yes if we were Chinese. In our family we make a big thing about birthdays and always have. I no longer feel I have to apologise for this because it is quite a lot of what makes us specially Kirby's (though this is much more from the Boyd tradition - thanks Papa) There was a posters about the drug treatment centre Odyssey House (where Geoff Soma was in Chch) I recall seeing long before I worked in the alcohol and drug field Poster showed boy having his first birthday party aged 11 as his mother was finally getting treatment. It was the first time it really hit home to me how important marking the milestones might be.

As I think about milestones and the celebrations we have and I can only hope that whereever you are celebrating NYE for 2011 and whoever you are celebrating with I hope you are seeding some memories that will be able to be stored and recreated to be retold year after year. The retelling is at least as important as the actual event and what makes for the tradition.

May 2012 bring you much happiness

With my love this year, next year and for years afterwards . . .

Sandra/Mum