2014: The Definitive List Of Retrospective Things

Wow, what a year! There were ups, there were downs, there were laughs, there were tears, there were days, there were months, there were low pressure systems, there were sandbanks. But most of all there were things. And though others may have impressed you with their looks back at the things of 2014, none of those OTHER lists are as comprehensive and definitive as this, my specially curated List Of The Things Of 2014, a retrospective of  the things that in 2014, we could say without fear of contradiction, were.


1. These sheep



Wow, remember these sheep? No? Well, someone does!

2. Oranges



If there's one thing you can say about 2014, it's "wow, this year people ate some oranges". Have truer words ever been written?

3. The guy from Blue's Clues



What did THIS guy get up to in 2014? Nobody knows! Apart from presumably his family and friends!

4. Exercise bikes



When we look back at 2014, will we remember it as the year of exercise bikes? We might!

5. Bricks



Some people might have thought we'd be "over" bricks by 2014, but no, bricks carried on as strong as ever!

6. An angry leopard



It's amazing how often this year our lives were impacted by the existence of an angry leopard. I sure didn't see that coming a year ago!

7. President Barack Obama



A lot of good judges think 2014 was the year that President Barack Obama was more president than he'd ever been. The thousands of people abducted by Mr Obama during the year would agree!

8. Trains



Whether you live in the city, the country, or the bottom of the ocean, one thing's for sure: 2014 had trains in it!

9. Hunting in bright clothing



It was almost like an epidemic in 2014, as millions of people suddenly put on bright clothing and hunted!

10. Machines



If you're like me, you were stunned by how many machines were in places in this past year!

11. Writing



Against all expectations, writing kept happening!




WOW! What a year!

Rolling Over

I have never liked New Year's Eve much. This is mostly because I find it fairly meaningless. I've struggled to see a point to it ever since it dawned on me that the time at which we decide a new year has started is completely arbitrary, and we are therefore celebrating nothing. Also since it dawned on me that I don't get invited to parties and everyone on earth is having more fun than me even when it's NOT New Year's Eve, let alone when it is.

So my dislike of the occasion really comes down to irritation at others making a big deal over something I'm basically indifferent to.

Or to boil it down: in this, as in all other things, people give me the pip.

But no matter how rationally you assess the emptiness of New Year's, you are human and the mindset seeps in: this is the end of something, and the beginning of something else. Draw a line under the last 365 days, we have a new batch for you.

But...that's worse.

Because I'm someone who has always found himself being borne ceaselessly into the past. I obsess over past disappointments, fret over past mistakes, analyse past events, and wish myself back in time, either to right wrongs, or to enjoy better times. I can't escape the past: a memory with a peculiar gift for keeping the most minor events and throwaway comments accessible in my brain has caused me to be constantly poring over what has been even as I look forward to what will be.

It's not all bad - a keen awareness of where you've been gives a good sense of perspective, provides a foundation for your life.

But it also tugs at you, bites and tears with regret.

And at New Year, the celebration of the ticking over of the calendar just makes me look back at the year about to end, and suddenly I am crushed beneath the weight of the disasters, and the failings, and the regrets. The end of the year does nothing for me so much as make me hang my head in shame for the hash I've made of it.

So I just can't get myself in that celebratory mode. Festivities are not for me at the end of 2011. It's too awful what we've been through to get here.

But what's done is done. I can't change the past, as much as I'd like to. I can't make amends. I can't balance out the world. All I can do is apologise, and apologies seem all that's appropriate for me as we stare out into the seas of 2012.

So I'm sorry. I'm sorry I haven't been as good to you all as I could have been. I'm sorry to those who I've let down, my family, my friends, my readers. I'm sorry for the mistakes I've made, I'm sorry for the jobs I've stuffed up. I'm sorry for being a bad friend, a bad husband, a bad father, a bad brother, a bad son. I know I'm not always bad - I'm sorry for letting myself be bad when I know full well how not to be.

I'm sorry for being surly, and moody, and irritable, for not being as kind, or as companionable, or as amusing, as the man inside me screams at me to be. I'm sorry for letting down everyone who knows me, and for letting down everyone who might know me better if I hadn't failed.

I'm sorry for those I've upset: who I've saddened and angered with my thoughtlessness and stupidity. And I'm sorry that I have driven some away so completely they probably won't even read this. I hope they do - I want more than anything for them to know how sorry I am.

I'm sorry to you all for the ways I've wronged you, and with the deepest shame I admit I am sorry for the ways I'll wrong you in the future.

And maybe more than anything, I'm sorry to myself, for not living up to my own standards, for being too lazy, or too irritable, or too selfish, to be who I want to be. I'll try harder and harder, and I'll be sorry again for falling short I'm sure.

The world is a beautiful place, full of beautiful people, and I'd like for as many of those beautiful people as possible to feel that my existence in the world makes it just slightly better. But for all those moments when I fail in that, for all the times I've made someone's world a darker place, for all the times I've stumbled and forgotten my lines in this show...I'm so sorry.

There WAS a Year Zero!

Seriously, there was! Or at least, there COULD have been.

Snooty pretentious people like to sneer at those who would say 2000 is the start of a new millennium, or 2009 is the end of a decade, by saying, "Well, there was no year zero, so the decade/century starts at whatever-01, so blah blah blah".

BUT!

The idea that there can have been no year zero depends on one counting years the way one would count, say, magic beans, that is, start at 1, then 2, 3, etc.

HOWEVER!

We are counting years here, and not just years, but years since a supposed person's birth (we are aware that the said birth probably never even happened, and even if it did, it didn't happen at the point the calendar's dated from, but that's the conceit it's based on, so let's go with it).

And what do you do when you count the years since someone's birth? You say "Mr X is ONE, when he has finished his first year, not when he is starting it.

In other words, in all of our lives, there IS a year zero - the year from our birth up to our turning one year old.

And there is no reason not to suppose that, say, the year 2010 marks, not the start of the 2010th year, but the year following the END of the 2010th year.

That is, the number attached to the year indicates the "age" of the world, counting from 0, not the progressive year. In just the same fashion as somebody who is 50 is living in their 51st year, and the 1900s were the 20th century, it is entirely reasonable and consistent to say that 2010 is the 2011th year.

Now of course it's all arbitrary anyway, and the starting point of our calendar was just plucked out of the air, but the fact is that those who claim "there was no Year Zero", "the millennium began in 2001, not 2000", etc., are relying on making a grand statement that sounds unassailably rational, and will therefore not be questioned. Since, once questioned, the grand statement is found to be entirely without evidential backing, and the stater to have not a leg to stand on. The entire argument is a house of cards, waiting for clever people like me to blow on it.

There is absolutely no reason there can't be a year zero. The assertion that there was is just as sensible as the assertion that there wasn't, with the added bonus that it accords with our natural human sensibilities to see a year like 2000 as a milestone, rather than 2001.

Incidentally, the only reason people are really kicking up about 2010 not being the start of a new decade is that 2010 is not blatantly enough a change from 2009, especially since most people are still pronouncing it "Two Thousand and Ten". It's a lot easier emotionally to accept 1990 as a new decade following 1989 - 80s to nineties - than it is the seemingly non-existent distinction between nine and ten.

Tell your friends!