AUSPICIOUS BEGINNINGS AT THE END OF JANUARY

Belated New Years greetings to everyone! I have been using my time to work on what will eventually be a book on activating the magic within individual tarot cards. I actually started on that book many years ago, but then the project stalled, so for the month of January 2010, I was really keen to renew my efforts and make some headway on that. (And I have a bunch of other projects in addition to that one.) The writing is slow going, due to the demands of work, school, and family. I work as a transcriber, so when I come home after eight hours in front of the computer and a long commute, I’m feeling pretty stiff, and it’s hard to force myself to get back in front of the computer to do my programming and other homework, let alone to write. On top of that, I have certain relatives who need my undivided attention, so I seldom have free weekends. I take various evening classes, weekend seminars, and online classes working towards developing skills in multimedia and web development, but I’ve had to cut back on the classes due to the family obligations.

Actually, when I am writing, I don’t do my composing in front of the computer. All of my stuff for books and articles I write by hand, on scratch paper, while sitting in bed, or at lunch, or whatever. Consequently, I have thousands and thousands of notes that I have yet to transcribe to disk and integrate into article and book projects. I can’t compose in front of the computer because that causes me to fall into a trance, due to the brain disorders I have as an Asperger’s person. I’d like to say I see fairies while in trance, (like the Victorians believed you could do when you fell into in a “brown study”), but I only experience it as a temporary form of non-existence. Transcribing does not cause me to go into trance, because it involves different sensory functions, and programming is also different, especially as I’m a new learner.

Looking back on the beginning of this year, people often make New Year’s resolutions, and it is often joked that half of those resolutions are broken by the end of the first day. For this reason, I think we should also celebrate January 2nd, as a day for second chances, and to affirm that we all need and deserve second chances. By the same token, if January is the month for new beginnings, February could be considered the month for second chances. This is make all the more meaningful by the fact that Chinese New Year falls in February. Even if you aren’t Chinese, you can seize on this as a chance to celebrate anew, and to renew your commitment to improvement.

Indeed, if we look at the world’s New Years festivals, we see that they fall throughout the year: Iran and some other Middle Eastern societies start the year at Spring Equinox, Thai New Year is in April, Jewish Rosh Hashanah is in September, and the Celts had two new years—May 1st and November 1st . There’s always another New Year coming along. I’m not suggesting, here, that we get lazy about our resolutions for self betterment. Rather, I look at it in the spirit of that old 1970’s cliché, “Today is the first day of the rest of your life.” With each dawning, we are renewed.