It takes years, not stroke of midnight for change to happen

THE EDITOR, Madam:

How does a single stroke of the clock at midnight turns anything magically one way or the other? Maybe not simultaneously, for different countries usher in the new year at different times. This makes it even more preposterous that there is anything intrinsic in the birth of a new year.

It is almost like the throbbing joys and possibilities that a new car promises, without regard to how driving it will fulfil those promises. I think all New Year’s hysteria is flat out superstition and an infantile pastime. It is the grand recurring magic that days and years change people instead of 12 midnight. The headaches and sorrows of the old year are automatically dumped there – like a donkey breathing a sigh of relief at ditching two burdensome hampers.

As much as the psychological relief that comes from entering into a new year may appear beneficial, months down the road, the replay of the old year starts all over again. This is because humans are eternally hopeful, and, often, the hope supersedes their own reason for existing.

People create years; it is not the years that create people. Years are blank canvases rolled out to be worked on. One may choose to paint a picture of negativity or of love, hope, health or togetherness; that is one’s choice. The canvas, like the years, is just the vessel on which anything is created – whether negative or positive.

For people are the ones who make their lives in years.

HOMER SYLVESTER

Mount Vernon, New York