New Years Shmew Years

It's getting to be that time where you have to start figuring out plans for New Year's Eve. Latin Grammy's broadcast aside I usually find New Years Eve to be the most over hyped night of the year. Granted it can be fun, especially for singles at parties willing to lurk shadily by attractive strangers right before the ball drops. More often than not though, I feel like for all the debating and planning that goes into it the results rarely pay off. I guess I can trace my bitterness with New Years back to ninth grade when I accepted a baby-sitting job and consequently missed the party of my high school career at Sara Abbott's house. With the promise of a hefty pay day -and I don't mean a King Size peanut covered candy bar- I convinced a friend to baby-sit with me. We were sitting for one seven year old boy, the son of my mom's co-worker. The co-worker told my mom that he realized my friend and I were making a big sacrifice and that he'd make it worth our while. Sara Abbott's party ended with televisions stolen from her house, rooms completely flooded and much of her living room furniture on the lawn by the end of the night. As for my friend and I? We had to let this obnoxious brat repeatedly beat us in indoor soccer which we played in a tiny dank room in the crappy basement of an even crappier house. When it finally came time to put this lil' fucker to bed my friend and I hurried off to the den to see what kind of entertainment system awaited us. But before I could discover that they had no cable on their 13 inch black and white TV, junior called me up to his room. He then informed me that he couldn't stop think about Muffin, his grandmother's recently deceased cat. Let me tell you, it's pretty awesome exploring the uncharted territory of coping with death with a painfully annoying child you barely know and care for even less. Mercifully he eventually agreed to try to go to sleep despite feeling "so sad." I then joined my friend in watching Boyz II Men dazzle the audience at Dick Clark's New Years celebration. Finally the dad came home. I told him that he might need to follow up with his kid about the concept of our mortality and then waited for him to hand over the loot. I remember distinctly before handing it over he asked "How's $20 sound?" Outrageously, offensively cheap I thought. Gutlessly, I said nothing and my friend and I walked away with ten bucks each. Not only were we not paid handsomely, we weren't even paid the standard rate for a normal night of sitting at that time, and we had to split that chump change. Now do you understand why I think New Years is a crock of shit? I wonder what that kid is up to these days. More importantly is it possible that he still believes that his grandmother's cat is going to come back to life upon the 15th anniversary of its death as I promised him that night during my "how death works" speech?