Birth of a Weblog

New Year's Eve, and I'm on my way in to Zealand Falls Hut for my first stint of the winter this afternoon. Thirty-five guests have reservations for tonight, but with today's rain and warm temps, I'll expect fewer. New Year's is typically a busy time at the huts (full capacity at Zealand is thirty-six) as groups hike in with sled-loads of booze to mark a calendar in the middle of a forest that just doesn't give a damn. I'm hoping that today's rain will at least mire some of those sleds, even if it will ruin the skiing.

New Year's is a holiday I've never really understood- what exactly are we celebrating? Time passing by? The Roman calendar? And the end of the countdown is inevitably disappointing as we see that the new year is just like the old one. There's no miraculous leap forward into the future, or rather, the future is always arriving, constantly, not only in this one instant but in all of the infinite other moments of the year when we aren't watching the clock.

So I'll pass on the Auld Lang Syne tonight, but returning to Zealand after more than two months away- that's something worth celebrating. Here's hoping that your New Year's Day will be as lovely as I expect mine to be.

What I'm reading now:
The Beans of Egypt, Maine by Carolyn Chute. Some local lit to pump prime my sense of place. Too bad the Appalachian Mountain Club doesn't count more people like the Beans among its membership.