Prycer Consulting

They spent the old year’s last hour quietly around the fire.  A few minutes before twelve, Captain Jim rose and opened the door.

“We must let the New Year in,” he said.

Outside was a fine blue night.  A sparkling ribbon of moonlight garlanded in the gulf.  Inside the bar the harbor shone like a pavement of pearl.  They stood before the door and waited–Captain Jim with his ripe, full experience, Marshall Elliott in his vigorous but empty middle life, Gilbert and Anne with their precious memories and exquisite hopes, Leslie with her record of starved years and her hopeless future.  The clock on the little shelf above the fireplace struck twelve.

“Welcome, New Year,” said Captain Jim, bowing low as the last stroke died away.  “I wish you all the best year of your lives.  I reckon that whatever the New Year brings us will be the best the Great Captain has for us–and somehow of other we’ll all make port in a good harbor.”  —“New Year’s Eve at the Light,” Anne’s House of Dreams, L. M. Montgomery

I have long loved this image of New Year’s Eve and have even been known to open the door at midnight.  It has all the qualities in a New Year’s Party that I look for–good friends, laughter and stories.  No fancy parties for me!

Here’s to a 2010 filled with lots of good books and good history.