By: Scott Hyatt
I’m starting to feel the pressure. Are you feeling it? New Years Eve is around the corner and that can only mean one thing in New York City. I must soon commit for the biggest night of the year. I have to be honest. I hate New Years Eve – absolutely despise it.
A friend once asked me, What is your favorite day of the year? Without thinking, I spurted out – January 3rd I think it caught her by surprise because she asked why I picked such an odd date. I explained how January 3rd is a day when we can all get on with our lives.
The pressure of New Years is behind us. Adding to the misery, the amount of pressure going into New Years rarely exceeds the build-up. For New Yorkers, that pressure is amplified.
In other cities, New Years Eve comes and goes and everyone wakes up happy in the morning. But New Yorkers wake up with a bigger hangover and $500 in new credit card debt.
Did I make the right decision? Did I go to the right bar? Should I have gone to that apartment party in Brooklyn with my other group of friends? How much fun did my other friends have? And adding to this self-imposed compression, you can’t just show up at the bar at 11, order a beer and toast to the future.
Nope, this is New York City. It has to be more complicated and exert more energy than every place else, just like that weekly trip to the grocery store. You don’t get to pull the grocery cart up to your car. In the City, you have to haul the heavy bags for blocks, regardless of whether it is rainy and cold.
Restaurants and bars make it just as difficult, requiring reservations weeks in advance. What happens if I break up with my girlfriend between now and New Years? Is there an insurance policy I can take out on these reservations? But here is where I really feel the pressure.
My time for finding a date is now finite. My window for a relationship is closing. No one wants to be alone on New Years Eve. It’s why all of my favorite movies like, When Harry Met Sally and About Last Night, take their climatic turn on New Years Eve. It’s a night when we are all forced to reflect and ask: Is this what I want?
I don’t think New Years Eve is the biggest hook-up night of the year even by New Yorkers’ standards. I bet it is Halloween when everyone gets to be someone else. New Years Eve is the opposite of Halloween. It’s the yin to the yang.
While we get to bathe in debauchery in our Halloween costumes, we’re forced to reflect and project on New Years. Sometimes, that reflection is a little sobering, especially if you suspect you are on the wrong path. So I guess I must ask myself now– is this what I want? If I knew you a little better, I would tell you but even guys need to remain a little mysterious at times.
At least there is some relief knowing that we survived the end of the Mayan calendar. I can already feel my blood pressure leveling and the white blood cells congregating. I don’t know how I’m going to deal with this new year’s eve.
