Friday, December 31, 2021

Happy New Year 2022

 The antonym of "Happy New Year" would be "Unhappy Old Year". Year 2021 was pretty close to that for many, though better than the previous year. 2021 paves way for the year 2022 - a new year we wish will make 2021 a forgettable one. While wishing so and stepping into it, with thousands of Nostadamus and Malika predictions from Whatsapp University circulating on social media, we don't know what lies ahead and what's in store for us. As the old man 2021 bends his spine and extends his hand to open the door to welcome the New Year, it is now time for some retrospection. 


The passing year 2021 will be forever be remembered by me for several unique reasons - Coronavirus pandemic caused by its Delta variant which killed millions across the globe and a new American President taking office. For the first time an Olympics was held in an odd, unscheduled year. And for the first time since 1993 a new President was sworn in after the defeat of an incumbent one term President who lost his reelection.

A la getting rid off old cloths for the new ones, the soul moving from one body to another as famously extolled by Lord Sri Krishna in the BHAGWAT GITA (a Hindu Scriptue), year 2022 will be reborn yet again at midnight tonight as the soul of 2021 passes away. The year dawns with the cherubic smile of a newborn, as another number is added to its age in the form of a New Year.

But hardly anything else ever changes with the arrival of the new year. For me the mundane life trudges ahead as the same shit, different day - with different color and texture. Hardly anything cataclysmically different occurs, the status quo is maintained more or less.

I don't make any New year resolutions myself, as I don't and I can't keep them anyway. Resolutions like promises are made to be broken. I simply roll over to the year ahead of me.

We may forget history but we don't forget to repeat it year after year. Similar to this starting stanza of the Kishore Kumar's song :

EK RUUT AYE, EK RUUT JAYE PHIR,
MOUSAM BADLENA, BADLE NASEEB.

"One season comes and another goes,
Seasons don't change, fate does". 

This year came and went with a mixed bag. It was all good, bad and ugly for me, with additional baggage of memories gently rolling into next year. Made new friends, revived old ones and lost a few near and dear ones, once and for all. Yet the year comes with this stark reminder - life goes downhill from here, tasks become uphill and years are numbered before we go over the hill. 

To me, almost all the New Year wishes expressed over the years have been too pleasant to makes them forgettable. The Homo Sapien species has this inherent instinct to remember the unpleasant ones. I am no exception. Remember this one from 1st January, 1982. On the first New Year after his marriage to Diana, Prince Charles wished the nosey British Paparazzi, "Have a Nasty New Year".

But I don't have to be nasty. So let me repeat the forgettable wish, as I do not forget to do at the end of every year - HAVE A WONDERFUL NEW YEAR ahead and stay blessed.

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