This year has happened all at once, and hasn’t stopped once all year. It’s been one thing after another, but somehow all got on top of itself. Nonetheless, here’s my attempt to flatten it out into an annual retrospective. It’s a little less procedural than previous years. If you don’t wish to spectate I suggest you scroll to the bottom and read the last sentence. There’s nothing particular there, at least not yet, but you can at pretend to have read everything in between.

They say the skies are bigger Up North. I’ve recently witnessed this natural phenomenon first-hand. It’s true. The best theory I have so far is that the sky expands, inching out and pressing down toward the horizon. Meeting abrupt and solid bedrock, it flexes and springs up, vault-like, forming a dome. As any structural engineer will tell you, this paraboloid is capable of supporting and holding back crushing weights. The arch transfers the load deep into its footing, pushing downward and outward. The earth supports it, gentle and sufficient. As long as the horizon remains firm, anchored, the cosmos remains supported and the world still turns.

This time last year I came to the conclusion that it’s better to celebrate new year in the summer than the winter. See what you’re dealing with. Get it over with in the daylight where you can see the thing clearly rather than stumbling around for it in the dark and probably knocking it over. And whilst there is something to be said for huddling around a cauldron of mulled wine bubbling on the stove, sacrificing ritual resolutions to ourselves to Do Better This Year so that the sun will rise again, I find that I can see so much further in the daylight.

I think that summer is a far better host to ‘new year’ than winter. If you’re lucky enough to be able to take time out to enjoy it, it offers a chance to stop whatever you were stuck doing for a little while and think about it. A reset, and chance to look backward on the last year and forward on the next. For me, winter is all about hard work, when everything’s an effort. Hardly the time to stop and think. I’d much rather do that basking under the sun than huddled round a fire.