New Years Day

I've said elsewhere that of all the good things this world affords, there's few as self-evidently blessed as second chances.  In a way I think that's why we have new years (aside from keeping the calendar- and diary-industries in business).  On New Years morning, anything is possible, and the year is a fresh piece of clay waiting to be moulded and shaped into a new form.  Dreams can be pursued for 12 months, projects created, and one's own city on the hill is still for building or rebuilding.  And the old year becomes memory, and the errors and defaults in it either learning experiences, or troubles to be buried in the unmarked graves of the past.  The new year stretches out ahead, with promise and with the hope for blessedness and love, for gentleness and peace.

My own NYE was pretty rewarding.  I attended to some thngs at the sharehouse in the morning and went to the office for most of the afternoon.  I was paying some bills when I looked closely at the last Telstra bill from the house at Heatherton and was pleasantly surprised to discover it was a credit notice.  A phone call later and Telstra agreed to send a cheque for the relevant sum.  Hurray!

I got done what I wanted to do by 6pm and went to vigil mass at St Mary Star of the Sea in West Melbourne.  The priest officiating made a very reverent Mass, but with a very thick Dutch accent that was rather hard to follow.  After Mass I came back to the sharehouse and wound up having dinner and a few drinks with two other residents on the patio - With K (the Queen Bee type character with the somewhat curious business model) and A (a new resident whose life sees him living in the UK for 6 months and in Melbourne for 6 months).  At midnight we went up onto Nicholson Street to watch the fireworks.  It turned out that going back to the house was a stroke of genius: The fireworks went up from all across the CBD and Docklands and from Brunswick I'm pretty sure we actually had the best seats in the house.

Happy new year everyone!

PS: The photo isn't mine - it was taken this morning by an old friend of mine at Nyora, but I thought it was too good not to share.