Reflection on Past New Year's

Sometimes, like just about everyone I know, I have a night when my mind races and sleep is crowded away by perceived problems or just simply memories and random thoughts. Last night I had one of those nights. After getting to bed late, I was counting on sleeping late, but I woke up in the early morning hours. When that happens, I try to concentrate on pleasant thoughts, the Hallmark thoughts that are soothing and stress free. So I thought about past New Year's.

When I was very young, I don't remember there was much to-do about seeing a new year in. Back then, Christmas vacation extended for two weeks at the most, so it only meant that my vacation time, time to play in the snow, read on cold days, enjoy time at home doing special projects with my father or my mother, going sliding with neighborhood kids late at night, all without having to go to bed or get up on schedule, would end. I loved vacations from school! It wasn't until I went to high school that New Year's Eve became "special." I remember going to a midnight movie in Barre. I felt pretty grown up to be in the theater on a date, that late at night. After watching some movie I've forgotten, the big screen lit up with fireworks as "Auld Lang Syne" blared over the speakers. That was probably my senior year, and I don't remember ever attending a midnight movie again.

Most years I was at home for the Christmas holidays and weather on Cabot Plain interfered with travel plans more often than not, so staying home on snowy, wind-blown nights was wisest. After I went to St. Johnsbury to work, New Year's Eve became a really big deal. There were parties at restaurants with special menus and dancing to live bands. The Blue Moon was a favorite dine and dance venue - also Aime's at the junction of Rts. 2 and 18 where I was regularly served a Jack Rose cocktail, but I was not 21 and if the liquor inspector showed up, my drink was magically switched to gingerale or a Shirley Temple. Proprieter Johnny Bisson at Aimee's was a good friend.

There were house parties, and I remember sometimes going to several in one evening. We always dressed up for New Year's. Actually, back in the early 50s, it seems as if everyone dressed up when they went out, even if it was just to go grocery shopping. And it would be a huge fashion mistake not to have a special outfit for New Year's Eve. Those years went by very quickly - I worked at Lesnick's DeSoto-Plymouth and Farm Machinery, got married,  then worked at radio station WTWN for a few years. The radio station brought big bands to play at St. Johnsbury, and that was very special. I had been with my cousins in Hartford, Connecticut to see the Benny Goodman band after Tex Beneke took it over in the 1940s; and Count Basie and Duke Ellington one time in Minneapolis when I was in school there; by the mid-1950s, big bands were not as popular as they had been, so it was fairly easy to book them into a small town like St. Johnsbury. I think we had Stan Kenton, Tommy Dorsey, and maybe one or two others, I don't recall.

I retired from WTWN a few months before my first son was born in 1957, and for the next 10 years, was a stay-at-home mother. With a family, the New Year's parties were not as flamboyant. Ray and I usually got together with friends - Jack and Mary Allen, Neal and Marguerite Ayer, Paula and Irv Gray - and took turns hosting a special meal, and everyone was back home by 12:30 a.m. The pictures above are on the left, me, with Paula Gray and Mary Allen; on the right, Irv Gray, Ray Dimick, and Jack Allen - at our apartment on Webster Street, New Year's Eve, 1954.

When middle son, Bob, was at Peacham School, he and some friends formed the Peacham School Band. Not your typical school band, by any means. They played Beatles and rock. By then I was a single mom juggling a job and three youngsters. There were parties at the school for every possible occasion, and of course, the band played. Later they became Tressle, named after the tressle bridge over the channel leading into Joe's Pond. When they began to play gigs not associated with the school - all were under age, and liquor was served at these places, usually a small bar in town, so I was chaperone, along with a few other parents or friends. Eventually, Bob's band became the well-organized and popular TANK Band. One of their first gigs was at the Catholic School in St. Johnsbury, I believe it was New Year's 1978. I had just begun working at Social Security Administration in Montpelier where I met Fred. I invited him to that New Year's Eve party.  It was quite an introduction to our family. I'm pretty sure loud rock music wasn't his preference, and if memory serves, they had some pyrotechnics and someone smashed his guitar in a frenzied tribute to the New Year. Miraculously, the school administration was great about all of it.

As the years went by, Fred and I managed to be wherever Bob was playing, whether with TANK or as BB and the Phantom Band. I remember one holiday party at a church in Barton, I believe it was - Bob was filling in for some band that let them down last minute. We were amused by a very young priest who danced every dance and was the life of the party. Usually, he was booked a year ahead, often at Lancaster, NH.

There was one year that we decided to go to a New Year's party at a big dine and dance spot in Fanconia - I think it was called Hillwinds. Dinner was buffet style and we happened to be seated with an out-of-state couple. Our first clue as to how the evening was going to go was when we introduced ourselves and got a decidedly cool response from the young woman. The guy was friendly, but as the night proceeded, they began bickering. She was critical of the food, the service, it was too cool and too crowded, the music wasn't good; it was one complaint after another. It was about the worst New Year's Eves we ever had.

Oh, yes, and then there was the year I decided I'd have Fred record me lowering a lighted ball of Christmas lights from our flag pole on the deck as we counted down the minutes to midnight. The wind was blowing that night and the temperature was hovering around zero. It took  some persuading to get him out there with the camera, but he did it - although not without some complaints. It was pretty unusual for Fred to complain about anything, and his protests got me to laughing. As I was giggling and counting down the minutes, he was grumbling something in the background - probably just as well that it was muffled by the wind. Of course, we were the only two people for miles around that were out in that snowy, cold night. I don't remember if I ever put that video on the blog . . . !

These days, I'm very happy to watch some of the special shows on television, and let the New Year come without any assistance from me. I wish you all a very Happy New Year 2023!