My mother used to let Tammie and I stay up for New Year's when we were kids. Come to think of it, we had our own little celebration at 10:00 and then we were off to bed. I don't think that I really understood what all the hullabaloo was all about, but I enjoyed the food, the hats, Guy Lombardo and the Royal Canadians, and the wacky little noisemakers that my mother provided us. Somewhere, there is film of one of these parties, but I haven't been able to find it.
Usually, I get sad on New Year's and think of past years and people that are no longer a part of my life. When I was a teenager, our neighbor used to come to our house to celebrate the new year. The first time was in 1979 and her husband had just passed away. Mrs. Miller was originally from Brooklyn and would regale us with stories of her adventures with Milt through the years. One memorable story was when her husband was held from his ankles outside a window on the twelfth floor of the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in NYC. This scenario was funny enough, but he was also dressed as a woman. Mrs. Miller always jazzed up our celebrations. Of course, the rest of my family would have most likely fallen asleep when these stories began, but I had more stamina then and would sit wide-eyed as I waited for the inevitable punchlines. Edna was quite a character and I always think of her as the ball drops in Times Square.
I also think of my great-grandparents, Isaac and Meg Glendinning. My great-grandfather passed away years before I was born, but the two were married on New Year's Eve in 1909 and it obviously, was always a special day for them. In addition, Hogmanay was a huge event in Scotland and my great-grandparents being Scottish made sure that New Year's Eve remained very important to our family. One of their traditions was something called "first footing" or the importance of having someone with dark hair be the first to enter the house after midnight. Doing some research, it looks like originally it should have been a dark male bearing gifts, but I think they allowed a woman in first, as long as she had the required dark hair and a gift. I would guess that they must have given my Aunt Brenda some trouble that night, as she is a blonde and that was just terrible luck.
This year, I was going through a lot of memories and my thoughts often turned to Tammie and how this was the first new year that I would face without her. I had so much trouble staying awake for midnight, but at some point I started looking for my nephew, Derek and began to smile. Earlier, Sean and Lindsay were at my parent's home and it felt so good to have them there this year. I ate too much, but enjoyed having Tam's boys around and sharing some memories and laughs with them. As my mother said to me as I was leaving, having them around made a difficult time more manageable and as odd at it might seem, somewhat happy. I miss my sister and thank her so much for her two boys.
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