Tag: Happy New Year

• January 1, 2020

  For Auld Lang Syne

  

  Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
  And never brought to mind?
  Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
  And auld lang syne.

  A few weeks ago, as I was driving home from the grocery store, I passed the apartment I lived in when I first moved to Tacoma. More than six years ago, I arrived in the City of Destiny without a job or a plan for what I was going to do with my life. That first apartment was awful — cold, mouse-infested, and dingy. As I drove on toward the house I now own, in my new-ish car filled with groceries purchased thanks to a good job with a steady paycheck, I got to thinking about how far I’ve come in the last 10 years.

  There is something about the turning of a decade that feels like the end of a chapter. The fact that we break up years into groups of ten is, of course, completely arbitrary. But even so, history has layered previous decades with meaning and symbolism. We’ve even given some of them nicknames, like the Roaring Twenties. And so, I can’t help but want to mark this decade and leave my stamp on it, just as surely as it has left its stamp on me.

  And surely ye’ll be your pint-stowp!
  And surely I’ll be mine!
  And we’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,
  For auld lang syne.

  This decade turned my life upside down over and over again. I graduated from college, fell in love, moved to the Pacific Northwest, found gainful employment, got married, became a published writer, saw the world, bought a house, challenged myself to write a novel. I’ve experienced the happiest days of my life so far, but also some of the darkest.

  We twa hae run about the braes
  And pu’d the gowans fine;
  But we’ve wander’d mony a weary foot
  Sin auld lang syne.

  There is a tendency to romanticize the past; to blur out the pain and struggle; to sanitize our memories like a social media feed. There’s nothing wrong with that. I certainly don’t want to linger on past hardships, but I can’t deny that those moments are a part of the story, too.

  So, this New Year’s Day, I want to reflect on how far I’ve come and all that I’ve achieved and be grateful, but I also want to acknowledge that it’s been a rocky road to get here. There are always two sides to any story and no matter what the 2020s have in store, I’ll always carry my memories and experiences from this decade with me. As a kind, old Doctor once said, “We’re all stories in the end, just make it a good one, eh?” Happy new year.

  We twa hae paidl’d i’ the burn,
  Frae mornin’ sun till dine;
  But seas between us braid hae roar’d
  Sin auld lang syne.

  — 30 —

  Jonny Eberle is a writer and storyteller in Tacoma, WA. You can read his short fiction in Creative Colloquy and Grit City Magazine or listen to his podcast about writing and the creative process, Dispatches with Jonny Eberle (available on all major podcast players) While you’re here, please join the mailing list!

  P.S. – If you’re interested in learning more about the history of the Scottish poem turned global New Year’s Eve anthem, give a listen to John Green’s review of Auld Lang Syne in the latest episode of his excellent podcast, The Anthropocene Reviewed.
• December 31, 2017

  Full Circle: 2017 Year in Review

  

  Earlier this year, we were in Glasgow, Scotland at the Kelvingrove Museum. In one of the upstairs rooms, I remember being captivated by an antique orrery, a mechanical model of the solar system. Built by a Scottish cobbler in 1833, the orrery has 200 moving parts and simulates the movement of the planets as they were known in the 19th century. I lingered near the exhibit for a long time, taking photos of it before moving on.

  Now, seven months later, on the very last night of the year, I find myself thinking about the orrery again. Like the brass gears moving miniature planets in neat, circular orbits, the year 2017 has taken me full circle — both physically and mentally.

  Some things haven’t changed. I’m still struggling to find the time and motivation to write. Blog topics come infrequently. The novel manuscript I planned to complete this year stalled out. My stage play was rejected from every festival I submitted to.

  And yet, some things are radically different. I took a chance and applied for a new job where I work. I stood on the sacred Isle of Iona and sat among ruins a thousand years old. I watched the Moon nearly blot out the Sun. I rode a cable car in San Francisco and hiked to an emerald green pool in Zion Canyon. I finished a short story that’s plagued me for five years and got it published in Creative Colloquy Volume 4. I’ve spent lazy summer afternoons reading with my soulmate, baked a blackberry pie from scratch and seen many of my closest friends — even those living four states away.

  Our lives are made up of these little cycles. Days. Weeks. Months. Seasons. Orbits around the Sun. Much of it is repetition. We wake, we eat, we go to work, we sleep and we repeat the process. It’s not all bad. Habits help ground us. And without the mundane, how could we recognize the extraordinary? If it wasn’t for all of the overcast days, I probably wouldn’t take so much pleasure in a beautiful, sunny day.

  Here, on the cusp of the new year, I look forward to coming full circle in 2018 and seeing the brilliance among the ordinary. I hope you see it, too.

  — 30 —

  Jonny Eberle is a writer and traveler based in Tacoma, WA. His latest short story, The Disappeared, appears in Creative Colloquy Vol. 4 and can be found at King’s Books in Tacoma. Follow him on Twitter and subscribe to his monthly newsletter for exclusive content and recommended reads.
• December 31, 2014

  The Plunge

  

  All too often in my life, I wade into unfamiliar water. I gingerly stick in a toe and inch my way in. It’s an agonizing way to get wet. And it isn’t just a problem in literal water. When it comes to change, I can be slow to jump in the deep end. But not this year. This year, I took the plunge.

  Twenty fourteen was the year I jumped in with both feet. After moving from Arizona to Washington last year, I was timid. Moving was hard and I wasn’t able to get reliable, full-time work. 2013 ended in a rut and the early months of 2014 didn’t look promising. But things were looking up as the early days of summer brought sunlight to the dark northern latitudes.

  This summer, I got engaged to an amazing woman; I snared an excellent job; I published a short story; I moved into an insulated; mouse-free home and I built new friendships. I decided to take the plunge — into marriage, into a stalled job search, into my creative work — and it paid off. I could’ve gotten here by slowly tip-toeing my way into the water, but that route might have taken years. It wasn’t all easy, but the struggle was worth it.

  Life is about taking risks. It’s about jumping in even though the water might be cold. 2014 was the year I put aside my overly cautious inclinations. This was the year I jumped into the deep end. Let me tell you, the water’s fine.

  — 30 —

  Thank you for reading and following along with the ups and downs of this past year. What will you take away from your experiences this year? Let me know in the comments. Happy New Year!
• December 31, 2012

  The Year In Focus

  

  When you’re developing film by hand, you always print a contact sheet — a single print of all of the negatives on your roll of film. Every shot is laid out in neat rows, side by side for comparison. You can see which photos are correctly exposed, composed and lit and which ones you should throw away.

  When I look back on the year 2012, it’s as if I’m looking at the contact sheet from a roll of 35mm film. Some of the memories are crisp and clear, like the week I spent in Guatemala in March or my work on the Gathering in New Orleans this past July. Some are blurry, like my last semester of college. Some are long exposures that leave long trails of light in their wake where so many images overlap and crowd into the same small space, like the time I’ve spent with my girlfriend, Stephanie.

  Like a roll of film tucked into the dark recesses of a camera, you don’t know how a year will turn out until it’s over. Only in retrospect can we see the obvious — that we ignored an opportunity we should’ve lept at, that we lingered too long, that we didn’t wait long enough. And occasionally (but so rarely), that we were at the exact right angle with exactly the right aperture and exactly the right shutter speed to capture exactly the right shot.

  You never know how things will develop until you’re in the darkroom, long after the moment is captured on tiny grains of silver halide crystal…or after the moment has slipped through your fingers. The exposures on a roll of film are finite, you only get 12 or 24 shots and once you’ve pressed the shutter button, there is no changing them.

  Life is the same way. But that doesn’t mean that you should hoard undeveloped film. You have to risk taking the shot. Maybe it won’t be in focus. That’s okay. You can learn from that. But if you never load the film into the camera, if you never risk a bad photograph or an unpleasant memory, you’ll never have a chance at a beautiful memory.

  I took risks this year and now it’s all coming into focus. I hope you did, too.

  Happy New Year!

  — 30 —

  Thanks for reading this year! I’ll be back in 2013 with more of my signature wit and feats of linguistic prowess. Until then, please comment, share and follow me on Twitter: @jonnyeberle.

  Top Posts of 2012:
  Guatemala Through the Rear View Mirror
  An Examined Life: In Memory of Dr. Joel Olson
  An Open Letter to Sherlock Holmes