New Year’s Eve is Saturday, Dec. 31. After two previous lackluster New Year’s Eves — the first derailed by the COVID-19 pandemic, the second by apprehension over the pandemic and vaccinations — most of us haven’t had a proper year-end celebration or a debauched bacchanal worthy of Dionysus for a while. Rather, we’ve had to deal with social distancing or watching fireworks from afar or remembering the Zoom video chat login and password we need to celebrate with friends.
As 2022 comes to an end, with COVID-19 now accepted as part of life and with most Americans having some sort of immunity due to vaccines, boosters or previous infections, or protection due to weakened strains of the virus making the rounds, many of us will return to our full-throated celebration of the end of the year.
As I previously wrote, New Year’s Eve is my favorite holiday because it signals the end of the old and the hope for new beginnings. The arbitrariness of selecting a random date and time at an indeterminate point in the orbit around our sun for a collective celebration is perhaps the most human thing we could do as a species. After all, 2:47 p.m. Arizona time on Wednesday, Dec. 21, would make more sense astronomically, given that it is the precise moment of the winter solstice, but that doesn’t jive with our millennium-old calendar and anthropocentric dating systems. Nevertheless, here we are.
Since it falls in December, New Year’s Eve is always cold in the Northern Hemisphere, so we advise revelers to dress warmly for the occasion whether they plan to go to a bar, a friend’s house, the pine cone drop in Flagstaff or travel around the state in the next few days.
I’d add the same cautions for those traveling around the country, but given the ongoing nationwide flight cancellations, you’re either not getting there or you’re already there and will be reading this editorial days after your return.
Also, be very careful on the roads, as we are in the midst of winter storms that bring snow, rain and ice to our area. Sedona and the Verde Valley are expected to stay above freezing through the first few days of the new year, but weather can shift, temperatures can drop and certain parts of the region, especially Oak Creek Canyon and the heavily-shaded areas behind hills, can fall below freezing. The air may be in the upper 40s but ice can still form on the roadway, leading to the risk of assuming that the asphalt is safer than it is.
Arizonans being Arizonans, many are not accustomed to driving on consistently wet or suddenly icy roads.
Those of us who have lived in Sedona for decades may be used to the peculiarities of our roads, but we’ll likely have to deal with tourists up from Tucson or Phoenix to whom ice might be an oddity. We’ll also have loads of tourists here from dreaded California, to whom icy roads are as alien as a roundabout. Snowbirds from the north, however, will be masters of the conditions. Do what they do.
Likewise, if you decide to go out and drink, do not drink and drive. Sedona police, Yavapai County sheriff’s deputies, Coconino County sheriff’s deputies and Arizona Department of Public Safety troopers will be out in force, supported by additional funding from the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety for extra patrols on New Year’s Eve to counter the threat drunk drivers pose to the rest of us who will be staying sober or riding with a designated driver.
DUI arrests can land you in our police reports on Page 2A — or worse if you get into a collision. We remind readers that you cannot call and ask to have your name omitted from the police reports. If you want to appear in the pages of our newspaper, we would rather have it be for something positive you’re doing for the community and not because of an arrest.
That said, we encourage you to go out and enjoy the end of the year, enjoy your friends and sample a bit of the bubbly. There are several musical acts listed in today’s edition of The Scene who will be performing at various drinking establishments to close out the year, including at Mooney’s Irish Pub, Vino di Sedona, Oak Creek Brewery and the 10-12 Lounge in Clarkdale. The Sedona party band Naughty Bits will also play the Spirit Room in Jerome.
Say farewell to the year gone by. Mourn the friends we’ve lost and those we’ve buried. Celebrate the new people we’ve met and the babies born. Drunkenly sing “Auld Lang Syne” off-tempo and out of tune. Drive slow in the snow and rain. Make it home safe and sound. Drink plenty of water before bed and we’ll see you on the other side.
Christopher Fox Graham
Managing Editor
“Auld Lang Syne”
Lyrics by Scotish poet Robert Burns
Should auld acquaintance be forgot
And never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot
And the days of auld lang syne?
For auld lang syne, my dear
For auld lang syne
We’ll drink a cup of kindness yet
For the sake of auld lang syne
And surely you will buy your cup
And surely I’ll buy mine!
We’ll take a cup of kindness yet
For the sake of auld lang syne
We two have paddled in the stream
From morning sun till night
The seas between us Lord and swell
Since the days of auld lang syne
For old acquaintance be forgot
And never brought to mind
Should old acquaintance be forgot
For the sake of auld lang syne?
For old acquaintance be forgot
And never brought to mind
Should old acquaintance be forgot
In the days of auld lang syne?
For auld lang syne, my dear
For auld lang syne
We’ll drink a cup of kindness yet
For the sake of auld lang syne
