(no subject)

All our best for 2005 from djjo danthered bitterlawngnome vaneramos Marian and Brenna!

New Year's night

Street juggler at First Night, New Year's Eve.

~~~~~~~~~~

The event at the Old Distillery last night turned out to be a waste of time in most ways. It was poorly organized, the entertainment was scattered among several buildings, and we had a hard time figuring out what was going on where. My own immediate family has become a diverse audience, too; Marian wasn't interested in the jazz and blues offering.

Personally, if I could have afforded to sink into a quite inner space, forget about what anyone else wanted, I might have wandered around the Old Distillery indefinitely. The sensation of moving through a festive crowd at night, the play of lights across ancient stone walls and arched windows, jazz music fading in and out as we wandered up and down bustling alleys: these were mesmerizing. Christmas lights shimmered on water covering the small rink; a few people were still skating. The air was unseasonably mild. Those sensations were fit to experience alone, or perhaps with a lover or group of close friends when you're high or drunk and nothing matters but the company and impressions of passing masks and costumes, changing textures of conversation.

Children require a different quality of entertainment, something more structured.

Marian is emerging from childhood. She would have been satisfied to "mill about," but not in that particular environment. Later, after we had attempted Nathan Phillips Square but been deterred by the vast crowd, she wanted to wander up and down Queen Street, absorb its edgy energy. By then we had passed midnight; Danny, Brenna and I were tired, with the older ones creaky of hip and blistered of foot.

But I am like Marian, at ease in the night. I love a forest's absolute darkness, but the throbbing dreams of city shadows are equally entrancing. With vision reduced, other senses come to the fore: the smell of spices wafting from an Indian restaurant, two clusters of partiers hooting in response as they pass on opposite sides of the street, a man's cologne, the sour salt stench of the homeless. Night is magic.

At midnight we stopped in the median of University Avenue, sat together on a bench and listened as the distant crowd rose in a single roar. The lanes were jammed with traffic. All the cars started honking. New Year's greetings rose from clusters of pedestrians in every direction. A few silver fireworks erupted over buildings obstructing our view of City Hall. I leaned to Danny in front of all those cars and pecked him on the lips.