Something I'm Not Counting Down

So...My last year before my surgery is about to end. Is that a milestone? Someone once told me that any day is a milestone if you make it so.

Other people are "counting down" the final hours, minutes or seconds of this year. I have never done that, and I have observed the end of the New Year to the extent that those around me were celebrating. Some years I went to dinners or parties. A few times I went to concerts or other events. I can also recall at least a couple of other New Year's Eves in bed with someone or another. OK, Dear Reader: Did I satisfy your appetite for scandal? :-)

And this one...Well, I'm going to get some rest. Yeah, I know the past week has been restful. But the trip home undid at least a little bit of that serenity. The flight left more than two and a half hours later than was scheduled and landed in winds that whipped snow around the windows and wings as we landed in Newark Airport. Then the bus from the Airport to the Port Authority Bus Terminal ran slowly because it had to: See the previous weather report. On top of that, because we were going into the city late in the afternoon, the bus had to stop and start down the spiral that connects the New Jersey Turnpike to the Lincoln Tunnel, through which we barely moved at all, or so it seemed. At least a subway train came practically the moment I walked down the stairs to the platform.

And, when I got off the plane, I wore the jacket I'd packed over the one I was wearing on the plane. But I didn't have gloves or a scarf, so the wind seemed to go straight to the bone. I had the opposite problem I had on arriving in Florida: That day, on which the temperature was near freezing, I wore a courduroy skirt with black pantyhose and a knitted crew-neck sweater and cardigan, with a jacket over it. That was fine when I left for the airport, but thermically as well as aesthetically out of place when I stepped off the plane to 75-degree sunshine in Florida.

This night's weather-- about 15 degrees F and 30-mph winds--is the sort of thing that entices other creatures into hibernation. And I'm feeling that way, too. And so is Millie: She said her daughter was coming in, but she wasn't having a party. She kept her invitation open, but added that she's having a nice lunch tomorrow. I'm taking her up on that and will sleep tonight. Maybe I'll be up when the revelers in Times Square count off the seconds to midnight, but I won't make a point of staying up.

I'm already counting down to another milestone: 188 days to the surgery. I don't want to do any other countdowns, either now or after the surgery. Oh, I'd like to have things to look forward to after the "big day," and suspect that I will. But I'm worse than any kid waiting for Christmas or the last day of school. It's so unseemly, so unladylike, ya know? ;-)

With no apologies to T.S. Eliot, I'm not ending with a bang or a whimper. Rather, I'm starting something new, tonight and on the 7th of July. And, hopefully, other things as well.