I’ve never really been a huge fan of the whole, “New Year’s Eve” thing.  The only ball drop I’ve ever cared about was my own, and I don’t even remember it happening.  Probably because it either happened gradually over time, a testicular glacier, slowly carving my pubescence into the great plains of manhood.  Or maybe all at once, lost in the excitement of a near-death toboggan run through a mogul field, twin yo-yo’s wrist-snapped out of the nurturing upper cavities of my startled man-purse.

Opening paragraph ball-sack reference:  Check.

I guess I can remember New Year’s being kind of exciting as a child.  There was something vaguely cool about staying up through the end of one year and into the beginning of the next.   Passing over some imperceptible threshold into something new and different seemed novel and boundary-breaking.

Mom would try to make it a party for my sisters and me.  She’d open a giant, re-labeled moving box filled with an impressive collection of gently-used costumery from New Year’s gone by.  There’d be colorful, translucent, wrinkly-pressed, cellophane derbies, distressed, sparkle-dusted, paper toppers and dented, molded plastic bowlers.  There were beaver hats of every variety:  the Wellington, the Regent, the D’Orsay and the even the Paris Beau.  Next would come spangley drum majorette caps, feathered flapper hats, be-dazzled tiaras and necklaces, buttons and buzzers and horns and whistles.  A bottomless treasure of items she had fished from the flotsam of parties past. 

Once fully-outfitted, we’d get all cranked-up on Ding Dongs, Crunchberries and sparkling apple cider, and start practicing with our arsenal of noise-makers for the next four hours.  Then, at the stroke of midnight my sisters and I would step out onto our 4’x4’ back porch in our underwear, banging pots and pans with wooden spoons and screaming, “Happy New Year!” into the frosty air.  Inevitably, our neighborhood Boo Radley would emerge steaming from his lair, howl “Shut the Fuck Up!” and stand glowering in the moonlight, his dingy, open, terry-cloth robe flapping in the wind -- along with his genitals.

He once took a trenching shovel and be-headed a family of rabbits in his back yard while we neighbor kids looked on.  We could always count on him for good belly laugh.

As I got older and hornier, New Year’s became about parties and jockeying for position next to the single, drunk, hot chicks looking for someone to make-out with when the clock struck twelve.

Then, the girlfriend years:

“Let’s totally start making-out in 1987 and then KEEP totally making-out right into 1988!  Wouldn’t that be so totally cool!?!

“Let’s totally start making-love in 1988 and then KEEP totally making-love right into 1989!  Wouldn’t that be so totally cool!?!

“Let’s totally start orgasming in 1989 and then KEEP totally orgasming right into 1990!  Wouldn’t that be so totally cool!?!

“Let’s totally start fighting in 1990 and then KEEP totally fighting right into 1991!  And 1992!  And 1993!”

 “Oh, my God!  Look at that slut over there.  She’s totally staring at me!”

“Which one?”

“Du-uhhhh!  The one in the red dress!?!”

“Which one?”

“Are you deaf?  THE ONE IN THE RED DRESS!”

“Yeah, but which one?  There are like seven girls over there in red dresses.”

“Oh, my God!  I Fucking HATE you!  You are SUCH an ASSHOLE!!!!!”

Puke on my shoes.  Cry and puke in bathroom with girlfriend for 2 hours.  Re-emerge with broken heel and bleeding knee.  Tongue kiss me with that same mouth. 

“I’m sorrrrrrrrrrry.  I love youuuuuuuuuuuuu…”

Pass out in cab.  Puke in cab.  Wake up in Puke.  Thrown out of cab.  Carried home.  Undressed.  Showered.  Violated (kidding).  Pajama’d.  Tucked into bed.  Violated (not kidding).

Next came the, “Performing a New Year’s comedy show for an audience full of drunken idiots every year for a DECADE!” Years:

“Wow.  On behalf of the rest of the cast, I just want to say thank you for deciding to spend New Year’s Eve with us.  You people have really been… an audience.  We’re now going to improvise for you one last time.  Could I please have one final suggestion…

“You suck!”

“Thank you very much.  From the gentleman in the front, who has apparently soiled himself, our final suggestion:  “You Suck!”

“Excuse me, sir.  I’ve been told that you suck.”

“Not as much as this audience does, but yes.”

“Well, in that case, how does $5 sound?”

“Absolutely not.  I won’t suck anything for less than 10! 9! 8! 7! …

Once we were married, my wife and I somehow found ourselves members of the, “No big deal we’re just going to have a few friends over for drinks nothing crazy maybe some appetizers and hang-out real casual we don’t feel like going out it’s too expensive / cold / dangerous with all the drunks on the road it’s amateur hour out there anyway we’re just gonna watch the ball drop on TV” old people’s club.

And since our kids have been born, we’ve spent more than one New Year’s just hanging out with Grandma and Grandpa.  And you know what?  It was nice.

So, I guess what I’m saying is New Year’s Eve doesn’t really hold any particular allure for me or my wife.  We don’t feel like we’re missing anything by having a nice quiet evening at home.  Having said that, this past New Year’s Eve we may have written the final chapter in the book of lame.

Both of our kids had been sick for a week and we were even more exhausted than usual.

We tried to put them down early so we could relax and spend a little time together.  Our son finally fell asleep at 11:00. 

“Baby, are you going to want to have a little champagne?”

“I don’t know.  Are you?”

“I will.  If you want to.”

“Not if we’re not drinking-drinking.  Are we?”

“I don’t know.  If we do, then we would be.” 

“Do we even have any?”

“I think so.  It’s no big deal, I just wanted to know, if you do, so I could put it in the fridge so it’s chilled for midnight.”

“No, that’s okay, it’ll just take up space.  We don’t have enough room in there as it is.”

Later, sober, we’re watching a movie on Cinemax.

“What is this?”

“I don’t know.”

I happen to notice the clock on the DVD player.  It reads 11:59.  I lean over and give my wife a soft little closed-mouth kiss.  Her eyes never leave the movie, a movie she isn’t particularly interested in and probably wouldn’t be watching if it hadn’t already been on. 

“Happy New Year.”

“Is it?”

I look back at the clock.  Still 11:59.

“I guess not.  Wanna try and catch the ball drop?”

“Nnnnnn… no.”

In the next room, my son begins coughing.  Then gagging.  Then choking.  The clock strikes twelve.  My wife picks him up just in time to be showered in milky phlegm-streamers and half-chewed bacon confetti. 

Wrangling vomit in her up-turned shirt like an Amish maiden with an apron full of apples, she scrambles to the bathroom.  I help them both undress in the bathtub and quickly begin rinsing and scraping mucous and bile and chicken nuggets from their clothing before it sets in. 

My wife finishes showering our little rascal and hands him to me.  I wisk him away in a warm fluffy towel, dry him off, lube him up from head to toe in Cetaphil, put him in a fresh diaper and slip him into his favorite Wiggles PJ’s.

He’s falling back to sleep on my shoulder as I carry him to bed, a perfect little cherub curled up in my arms.  I smooth his hair into shape with my hand and kiss him on the top of the head.  He has that amazing baby smell, the best smell in the world.  When we reach the bed he looks up at me with the cutest little face...

and projectile vomits down my neck.