December 31 is in two days. Your Cultural Overlords demand that you celebrate.
You must attend a party. It must be chaotic and wild. You must drink to excess. If you decide to drive after such drinking, all the better. We need to reduce the surplus population.
You must count down the seconds until Jan 1, even though a similar countdown could be done every day at 11:59:50. It doesn’t matter. You must find someone to kiss at midnight. You must drink champagne and yell madly “Happy New Year.”
You must make resolutions. You need to lose weight. You need to save money. You need to be nicer to your children. You need to read more, watch less TV, go to the gym every day at 5 a.m.
You won’t keep the resolutions. Indeed, you have no idea of why you make them. Except that your Cultural Overlords demand it of you.
On New Year’s Day you must watch football. It doesn’t matter which team you root for. You must engage in this ritual. Just as you must watch the Rose Parade at 8 a.m. It is mandatory. We will be taking roll.
If you do not engage in these mandatory rituals, the Cultural Overlords have decreed that you will not have a Happy New Year. Your job will suck. Your friends will ignore you. Your spouse will fight with you over foolish things. Your money will run thin. You will no longer remember what it is like to have fun.
Until next New Year’s Eve, when you again have the opportunity to engage in manufactured fun.
You have been warned.
Mark Bruce, Writer 