2006

[brigdh]

So, it's the new year. Well, almost. It will be the new year in about eight hours, in my time zone. I like how that works; that it's still 2006 here while the year has already changed in other places. I first got the internet just a little before the new year 2000, when I was 15, and there was all that panic about the computers failing and Y2K and civilization collapsing and whatever. I'd been on a message board talking to people the morning of New Year's Eve, and the rest of the day various relatives kept bringing up the imminent doom and I would just say, "Nah, it'll be fine. I was talking to someone in Australia earlier, and they already passed midnight."

Too many things happened this year. I lost my virginity and got a tattoo, graduated from college only to immediately start graduate school, and moved far away from everyone I know. I had multiple family members die; I had my faith in humanity (what little of it there was) shaken by meeting crazy racist guy; people I know got married (!) and had babies (!!); I met people off of livejournal and had strangers be terribly nice to me. I'm probably forgetting a large number of equally important events.

Last year, for the holidays, I got a lot of people presents, or wrote them emails letting them know how much they meant to me. I didn't do that this year, because I am poor and I ran out of time. But everyone here has been even more important to me than before, particularly in the last several months. Things have been hard, more so than I like to admit, and everyone who has done something as small as leaving one comment or an AIM message or an email has helped me keep my sanity. If things have been bad, they would have been very, very much worse without you all, I can't say how much I appreciate that, or how grateful I am. Love you all.

Comments

[b-hallward.livejournal.com]

Best wishes for the new year ^^

God, the whole having babies things is totally freaky -- I have siblings and when they start reproducing it's... more than I can quite wrap my head around. Really, what is wrong with these people!

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

And same to you!

Man. At least I'm not related to anyone who's having children yet. I don't know if I could handle that.

[weirdquark]

My cousin, who is slightly less than a year younger than I am, recently got married. I suspect she'll spawn in the next few years, although she may wait a while. Cannot deal. I'm still getting used to being the right age to be married. And I'm not even that young -- twenty-seven is a perfectly reasonable age to be married and having children. But!

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

It is *so* weird! It seems bizarre to think of people of my generation making babies and being responsible for entire lives.

[p-zeitgeist.livejournal.com]

I can out-weird even that. My sister married a guy who's older than we are, who already had children by a first marriage. I can deal with those kids being old enough to be married -- hell, it's easier than dealing with kids who are children -- but I find I cannot deal at all with one of them having a new baby, or with my sister being anyone's step-grandmother. Gaaahh!

I was freaked enough a few years ago when my siblings went and had children. I'll say this for the experience, though: it stops one's parents looking anxiously at you and wondering when you're going to do your duty by the gene line. Which is of particular value when you know that the answer is, How about never? Does never work for you?

[b-hallward.livejournal.com]

Okay, you win. Or, possibly, lose since siblings-as-grandparents is so, so wrong. Though I wonder, at some point doesn't it just get surreal, as in sure, I'm okay with this since it Can't Possibly Be Happening? Or is it just freaky and disturbing all down the line?

Fortunately my parents already know that I've opted for how about never when it comes to having kids; getting them past the someday you'll meet the right guy and settle down part, well, I'm still working on that.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Oh, god, I'm with you on dreading the inevitability of the 'how's the search for Mr. Right going?' question. And I'm not even getting it merely from family this year; random strangers at parties felt the need to ask. There surely has to be some way to avoid it.

[b-hallward.livejournal.com]

There must be, but why should I have to explain myself? These people who just assume an entitlement to personal information, who have no functional understanding of privacy... it's beyond irritating, it's offensive. And somehow they don't get that. Grr.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's the rudeness of it that really bothers me. I try not to snap at anyone, because it seems the sort of question that might be 'normal' for people who are, well, not me, but I do take it just as you do. It's private. And more than that, if the answer is that I'm not seeing anyone, the heavy-handed encouragement of the "you'll find someone!" response seems to diminish the worth of everything else I'm currently doing.

It's grr-inducing on all sorts of levels.

[kessie.livejournal.com]

♥

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

*glomps*

[childofatlantis.livejournal.com]

Last night when I went to bed, I lay in the dark and imagined the new year moving across the world like dawn, slowly reaching each point on the spinning glonbe and passing it, followed by a trail of fireworks. It was a cool image. :)

*hugs* Happy New Year!

now I am going to be writing "06" instead of "07" for approximately 10 months, at which point I will get the hang of it, and then it will change again...

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Oh, that's a lovely picture.

Happy New Year to you, too! ♥

I can remember the year without too much trouble, but for some reason I always forget how old I am and have to think about it. If only the numbers wouldn't keep changing!

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

#^^# Aww. Thank you, so much. *hugs*

Happy New Year to you, too!

[mistressrenet.livejournal.com]

Love you too. :D

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

*glomps*