Twenty twelve

Every year my aspiration is to have a flat stomach. Hasn’t happened so far but I’m not one for giving up.

Why is it that we have so many expectations from our lives, the lives of others and life in general when the calendar changes to January 1st? We go around wishing everyone a year full of adjectives such as ‘stupendous’, ‘incredible’ and in the case of my friend, Naresh, who got a text wishing him a 'momentous' year. When I looked up ‘momentous’ on the online dictionary, the sentence that the word was used in as an example was ‘deciding to drop the atom bomb was a momentous decision’.

I hope I’m not sounding cynical because that’s not what I’m aiming for. I’m simply dwindling with the significance attached to the start of a new year.

Of course I hope that in 2012 the stock market shoots through the roof, that everyone I know is healthy all through the year, corruption gets eliminated and I get to have a meal at Per Se. But that would be just a little naive, wouldn’t it? I mean really - $400 on a dinner just for myself when I’m not even earning?!

On the other hand, where would we be without that four letter word that’s such an important part of our lives. Get your mind out of the gutter folks, because I’m talking about ‘hope’. Even if we sit on our pretty little asses, we hope that things will get better in the new year. Maybe a genie will grant me three wishes (actually I would be happy with just one).

Or maybe I should have realistic expectations from the year. Since I no longer belong to a gym, don’t intend to get a membership and a significant part of my life revolves around food, it’s highly unlikely that I’m going to get that flat stomach. So instead I’m going to hope that I don’t add any more inches to it.

Instead of hoping that I make loads of money in the stock market, maybe I should just wish that I don’t lose any.

Everyone I know will not stay healthy all through the year. So let me just hope that they don’t get seriously ill.

Hoping for corruption to get eliminated would be complete foolishness. So I’m just going to hope that it’s a little bit lesser in 2012.

And since a New York trip is not on the cards this year, I can’t expect a miraculous freebie dinner at Per Se. So instead I’m going to hope that I have at least 3 other memorable travels this year. Kashmir, Turkey and Rajasthan are my top choices today but not written in stone.

Whatever it is that the new year has in store for us, by the time we get to December 31st, we would have forgotten much of what happened. When I was returning home from a night of celebration this morning, I looked around at people walking, jogging, out on their daily errands. An ambulance was waiting to transport a gentleman on a stretcher. Neighborhood stores were starting to open. I stopped at the florist where the morning for the people working there was exactly the same as the previous one.

Was January 1st 2012 just another day?

Ever since I woke up this morning, the R.E.M. song has been stuck in my head.

It’s the end of the world as we know it
It’s the end of the world as we know it
It’s the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine.

Have a “momentous” 2012 everyone!