January Blues

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Fireworks go off, drinks go down, and New Year’s Resolutions kick in. Three days later they promptly kick out, replaced by the dawning realisation that no, it’s not a new chapter of your life filled with self-betterment, gyms, new languages, instruments, and exciting change, but rather just another day like any, except this one happens to restart the calendar. And this sums up January as a whole – a big wet yearly disappointment. In Britain perhaps that’s all year, but still perhaps it’s January the most. It’s horribly cold though never quite enough to snow, instead choosing to exist in a naff soggy limbo. The Christmas break didn’t even feel that festive this year, and for a lot of you, exams have crushed all hope. One day soon while trudging up a hill, your hands going numb because you forgot your gloves yet again, you’ll probably get splashed by a passing car. Yippee.

It’s horribly cold though never quite enough to snow, instead choosing to exist in a naff soggy limbo

But it’s not all doom and gloom. It is going to get warmer from now on, as we move into the most forgettable term of the year. I mean it still won’t be warm by Easter, but at least we’re going in the right direction, right? And this sums up January as well: one of those months that try as you might, you simply have to get through. None of the good bits of winter – the holiday, the family arguments, the mince pies that nobody really likes enough to keep them year-round but has anyway because it’s just what you do, isn’t it. January lacks these festive joys. January is a month of waiting. Waiting for February. At least February has the good grace to be short. And then we can get on with waiting for March.

Here’s to another bloody year, one day at a time.