This Time of Year

I know there are a lot of people who say they hate the holidays; they hate the crowds; they hate the enforced cheerfulness; they hate the inherent need to have someone to kiss at the stroke of midnight.

I can't say that I hate the holidays. I haven't celebrated them for years, so they do get under my feet like a distracted pet might but they don't effect me. I can't even say that I hate the first of the year. I dread it.

More than anything else that comes throughout the year, the first of the year is my Kryptonite.

I dig in my heels and it pulls me along, not noticing my struggle to keep it from happening.

My mother died in January. My grandmother died a half an hour before the new year. My sweet Maudry Moo died in February. I was asked to leave the place that I was living in January which lead to me having to move back to Maine.

For 48 years it doesn't add up to much as far as incidences go, but the weight of them, oh shit, the weight of them - I feel pinned to the floor.

I want to go to bed and stay there.

I try to be strong, I want to be able to not have this superstition, this down hearted feeling, every year, but I'm afraid that if I'm not consistently aware that it will blind side me. I'm smarter than this. Jinxes are filed under Villagers With Torches.

I know better.

But my heart cowers in the castle dungeons and waits for the inevitable.