Happy New Year's Fellow Freaks

I think wishing people “Happy New Year” is as empty of a sentiment as there can be. Considering people say it until like March, it truly is just a substitute for “how are you” for those who have gotten bored with saying that and need a three month reprieve from the same empty pat salutations. I mean, if you truly think about it, what really happens when the clock strikes midnight on January 1st? Nothing. There is a symbolic “out with the old in with the new” but nothing truly, physically ushers that in. Other than the banks are closed and there are some college bowl games (as well as the collective lamentation that you have to go back to work the next day), nothing really facilitates the “newness” of the year. Its not like we all swap houses or jobs. Or that we look different, or we are someone else. Its just a reminder that you just spent an additional 365 days on top of the previous 365 days and that if you so choose, you can call this go around “a new beginning.” And I am not even railing against resolutions. I know we make them and never follow them. That’s fine, that’s normal and human. But it isn’t even a milestone like an anniversary. Unless you have a terminal disease, making it to the next year was inevitable. You can sit in bed all year and develop a nice case of rickets and butt pimples and you will make it to the next year. Anniversaries, on the other hand, can be accomplishments. Particularly wedding anniversaries. Making it another year without murdering or leaving each other actually takes work.

No, this is a special kind of hallmark moment where there is virtually no accomplishment or drama. And no one means “Happy New Year” any more than they mean “How are you?” At least with “How Are You?” you can reply, equally as emptily, “fine.” But with “HNY” you have to either stay silent or say it back. And I hate saying it back. But I will because silence is just plane rude. So I am going to make them the rude ones for making me say it back to them.

And what does any of this have to do with the horror industry, or haunted houses, or my artistic endeavors? Absolutely nothing, but I have a platform and I am using it. Happy New Year!