A new year

I really wanted to write something profound about the new year.... but I took a nap instead. So you get my somewhat scattered musings in place of any well-crafted thoughts.

I celebrate three new year holidays.

There's the Jewish one, Rosh Hashanah, and there are several more Jewish new years as well, but we'll leave them out for now. This is the new year I celebrate with my family, ,y Jewish friends and  my synagogue community. We wish one another a sweet new year filled with good health, happiness and prosperity. Note which wish comes first. Always.

The Matched Set

Then there's the secular new year, which I learned in Israel to call Sylvester, after the pope of the same name. That's the new year I sometimes celebrate with friends. Drink champagne, eat a good meal, socialize and kiss your sweetie at midnight. Lots of people celebrate this new year. (Here is an interesting article about Saint Sylvester and the impact his saint's day had on European Jews.) 

Last is my own personal new year, August 20th. This is the date that my metastatic breast cancer was diagnosed. I'd been living with mets for some time already (no one knows how long), but on this date a doctor confirmed the diagnosis. He cried as he told Rik and I, this doctor we'd never met before. Every August I celebrate, again with family and friends, and blow cancer a big, fat, wet, Bronx cheer.

Years ago I told my cancer that I would give it living space in my body, as long as it's quiet. If it gets noisy, I ask Super Onc (Dr G) to throw everything we can at it to get it to quiet down again.

So I have nothing really profound to say about Sylvester, the secular new year, except to look for this new year to be a quiet one for my cancer and to look forward to celebrating my other two new years.