Sappy Phew Years

This has got to be the single most insipid day of the whole year. I wish I were a member of the Polar Bear Club because a dip in frigid waters might be just the trick to shock me out of me selfish, annoying, whining, selfish annoying self.

But its so comfortable here, so cozy being a whiner...except its a little ripe now, seeing as I haven't changed out of my pajamas from this morning...which were really my clothes from last night, The Night - the It's-the-best-night-of-the-year-better-than-the-prom-even-though-you-had-braces-and-couldn't-ask-Dirk-Stevenson-to-be-your-date-because-he-wouldn't-look-backwards-at-you-so-you-had-to-go-with-Sammy-"No Lips"-Tucker-night...

which really reads as:

Any-night-when-you-have-expectations-therefore-it-never-pans-out-and-life-ends-up-really-really-sucking.

Actually, Last Night will remain. Un. Divulged.

So here I sit, plunked really, almost 26 hours since the donning of my current clothes. Hair in knots from seven applications of hairspray (I even redid it at 3pm today so I looked nice for the Chinese food delivery man), lips stained eternally red (Sephora #572), Marcel Marceau-like rimmed eyes from mascara tortured by pitiful tears and nauseous heaving...

Surrounded by a Schroeder-like crowd of last night's twenty cigarettes, a stench like an old goat, I'm considering removing my stockings - which have now made permanent indentations on my chunky upper thighs that haven;t seen a treadmill since December 13 (but that was LAST year); however, I can feel through the scratchy nylon the millions of militant follicles standing on end ordering me to shave my legs, and that little lack of hygeine is grossing me out (that THIS should bring me to the brink rather than the other personal faux pas' I've committed throughout the day, I know now why)...

Today I've eaten (in no particular order) twenty shrimp cocktails, Cap'n Crunch (who made up that ellipse?) cereal sprinkled with pistachios, peanut butter and bananas, buffalo wings with ranch dressing, an old mushy apple from October, three Flirtinis with cherries and licorice, two glasses of water, five hot chocolates, an order of General Tso's, three tablespoons of sugar, and a partridge in a pear tree. Roasted in red wine and served with plum chutney.

And I've finally replaced most of the alchohol in my blood stream with oxygen. My mental capacity has returned to partial working order, and the latest, most lucid thought dissolving to the forefront of my brain, like an oompa loompa segment during the Mike TV episode, reads as thus:

You.

Are.

Pathetic.

(Doo-pa-dee-do)

What is happening to me? Last year started out so positive - changes, yes, and many pitfalls but I always seemed to get up and dust myself off. I can not blame my trajectory straight down into the underworld because of 9/11, because I know many people who have successfully dusted themselves off, literally and figuratively. Now they use words like, "faith", "lucky" and "compassion"; phrases like "in the moment".

And even I am not cynical enough to dismiss them. I know if they can do it, so can I.

I read on the internet recently a saying for the New Year: you can choose what you liked best about the past year, leave the junk behind, and only take the positive things with you into the new year. So, last night stays behind in last year, memories duly erased, and its time to shower myself.

I want to do that, move forward with the positive. I plan to do that. But only after a good sleep, some more tears, deep breaths, confession, and some serious question-asking.

God, that sounds hard and painful. I'm pouring one more cup of hot chocolate and watching "Just One of the Guys" one more time before switching out the self-effacing light and sucking it up.

Happy New Year. Welcome back.