I like to think of myself as different than the average person - more evolved, somehow. I am generally an unrepentant snob in this regard. But every so often I get a painful reminder that in reality, I am no better, no wiser, no more grown-up than last year. And I can laugh, and try harder this year to indeed become the better version of myself I know exists.
New Year's Eve - which I am just now recovering from because I am old and cannot drink the way I used to. (Know that feeling?) I took a cab with Little L to a friend's apartment, wrestling with the giant stroller alone as the cab driver sat smugly in his cigarette smoke-heat-blasting, little front-seat cubicle. A terrible wind blew, and poor Little L dangled from the crook of my arm, one tiny mitten dropping in the dirty snow. By the time we arrived at our destination, I was so bitter at cabbie's idiocy that I started immediately with red wine.
I entertained Little L in her fabulous party dress, watching her dribble food down the lovely front. Later, her daddy showed up, bearing pink champagne at my request. I had some of that. Then out into the 16-degree night we went, and because we are tired parents of a near one-year-old, we had no dinner plans. Walking from restaurant to restaurant with the giant baby carriage, we sought food unsuccessfully, with maitre'ds shaking their heads at 10:30 pm when we asked to sit down for dinner. This was New York?
Finally, a break in the void: a Mexican joint with a live band and deadly margaritas, of which I had three. I was becoming one of those people I can't stand on New Year's: she who drinks without reservation, trying drunkenly to teach her white husband to dance Salsa, angering him, angering herself, all while forgetting both the implications of tomorrow and the inevitability of Little L's waking at 7 am.
We walked home at 11:45 pm. Some random tequila-fueled argument ensued, and I sobbed at not being in the Caribbean with a sexy pirate or somesuch on such a cold night. The elevators in our building were broken, and the stroke of midnight brought an unsteady eight-flight stair-climb in stilettos carrying baby and stroller...still sobbing.
Bed spins began. Three a.m. found me sprawled on baby's bed, half-dressed and suddenly awake. Seven a.m. came fast, and the day was lost to physical misery. I thought of all the revelers in Times Square whom I always looked down on a bit, what with their standing willingly like half-wits in near-zero temps and throwing up in cabs and such. And yet, I was starting 2009 no better. It was an opportunity for humility -- a chance to remember that as different as our lives may be, we are all in moments quite the same.
Happy 2009, late. I hope your hangover's gone, too.
