Friday, January 01, 2010

Happy New Year

I have long held the superstition that the way you celebrate New Year's portends the year ahead.

Last night it rained. Big, fat, soaking, dam-raising, tank-filling rain. Lightning danced across the sky, lighting up the world as if it were day, and thunder echoed in the sky for so long, it sounded like an ocean tumbling past. We watched the clouds roll in from the West, while in the North-East, in a patch of clear sky, hung a huge round silver moon - a blue moon, the second full moon of the month.

Before the rain, in the pendulous, sultry heat, my children played under a sprinkler for the very first time. And in the dark, just before a fine mist frothed into the air, there were sparklers.

At midnight, a frog came to see the four of us as, climbing up the fly-wire door we sat drinking our last glass of wine. The children had just fallen asleep.

A quick google confirms what I already suspected. Frogs are a symbol of luck, fertility and transformation. Frogs also signify healing and prosperity.

I felt the universe flow through me last night, a quick ripple. There's something on the horizon, a kind of magic, something to do with friendship, love, peacefulness and hope.
Mark my words.

4 comments:

  1. We took pictures of that same moon, heard the cacaphony of rain, and I was awoken at (what I'm told) was almost precisely midnight, or a few minutes after, by the loudest explosion of thunder I've ever heard in my life.

    My mind sought significance of the event; perhaps it was nature's way of saying, I'm paying attention. Better keep honest, now.

    But like you I also hope that it was the old decade being smacked aside by a newer, healthier, jubilant one.

    Happy New Year xx

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  2. We might be hundreds of kilometres apart, but we stood and watched the same lightning whip around the sky, under the same cloud-tufted moon, and felt the same dollops of rain beat us in the back door. Marvellous, wasn't it?!

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  3. Happy new year, Penni!

    I thought it was rather grand sitting round as the pre-storm thunder and electricity crackled in the air and then retreating to a friends garage to party and listen to the rain - oh and watch the neighbourhood fireworks... and the children played happily till well past the hour. A happy portent if ever there was one.

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  4. Anonymous9:27 PM

    The lightning show was spectacular, far better than any fireworks and the rain is fantastic. We were unable to leave our friend's house until after midnight (we didn't want to get hit by lightning) and today we've been soaked again on the way home from a gig at which our children danced and giggled.

    Happy 2010! Lord knows 2009 bit me on the arse on it's way out the door and I'm happy to be rid of it in many ways.

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