January 2nd. Morning Drift number ten, I think.
It’s raining — raining heavily — as I go to work on the first day of 2026.
I’d been thinking about the New Year and the holidays. Not a big holiday guy, not a bah humbug — but it often feels like there’s a lot of fake sentiment.
I’m not some earthy-crunchy, finger-wagging type. But when someone who’s normally socially aggressive and slightly caustic suddenly becomes merry and cheerful for two weeks, it puts me on guard. When the season ends and they go right back to who they were, that whiplash feels dishonest.
I don’t understand what’s so magical about a date that it’s meant to rinse away the sins of the year before. If it matters, it could happen any day. The work doesn’t need a calendar.
Us recovering Catholics call it absolution or confession — atonement, making amends, whatever name fits. Those are things meant to be practiced regularly, not stockpiled for a single date. But every year, it seems like New Year’s Day becomes the rally point where everything is supposed to be fixed at once, and that kind of load rarely holds.
No day is more special than another — at least not by default. We give days meaning: anniversaries, births, milestones, moments that earn their weight. New Year’s isn’t one of those on its own. It’s just the end of a count and the beginning of another.
Sometimes I tell myself I’m better suited to do something tomorrow. There’s truth in that — starting a diet on Thanksgiving doesn’t make much sense. Timing matters. Still, it’s just another day. The decision comes down to mindset.
Resolutions aren’t January-only. They’re just decisions — choosing to act or change, and meaning it — and we make them all year long. We also break them. That’s part of it.
The other thing I’ve noticed is how people tend to remember the bad and overlook the good. When a year ends, the rough parts get replayed and tallied, and everything else gets waved off with “good riddance.” The wins don’t make as much noise. That wasn’t my experience of 2025. Deano had a great 2025.
It’s funny — as I had that thought, the rain started to ease. The storm didn’t disappear all at once, but the sky began to thin, and I could see the sun coming up over the east.
There’s no bad time to start a good habit. Timing can make things easier or harder, but it doesn’t decide intent. And if it really is the wrong moment, then it’s just that — the wrong moment, nothing more.
2025 was good.
Two days into 2026, I’m liking the view.
Tides and Truth... 