Flashback Friday

It's hard to believe that the new year has started. It seems like only yesterday that we were saying "Happy New Year." Wait - it WAS only yesterday. But I digress. Of all of the people I've talked to this week, I found only one that actually went out New Year's Eve night; everybody else stayed at home, and so did yours truly. While the 'Rents and I were watching TV and snacking, we started reminiscing about New Year's Eve past, and what a great time we had at The Compound's New Year's Eve parties.

The partygoers consisted of friends from church; everybody who came would bring food, and Mom would make her world famous orange sherbet punch. Why, a few years, even our preacher and his family would come. We'd all play games and eat, and just before midnight we'd get bundled up and most of us would go outside and get ready to shoot off fireworks and fire the guns. Mom's job as official party hostess was to watch the TV and keep track of the countdown to midnight. She'd stick her head out of the door and keep us posted of the countdown. Then when it was a few seconds before midnight, she'd count down "ten, nine, eight . . ." and we'd all yell the countdown with her. That is, everyone but me. I had my own special job at The Compound's New Year's Eve celebration: I'd be next door in the neighbor's yard waiting to ring the gigantic bell. And as soon as it was midnight, I'd ring the bell for all it was worth. Then I'd run home and we'd light the firecrackers and other fireworks before going back inside to thaw out and drink more orange sherbet punch.

The Compound's New Year's Eve party continued well until my adult years. And the same friends from church still came. Of course we were all older and the people my age were all "grown up" but we still had fun ringing the bell and causing a commotion at midnight. We did slightly break tradition one year: a party goer and I left shortly after midnight and crashed a party. The party crashing took place at I believe one of the last New Year's Eve parties we had at The Compound. It was in the mid-nineties, and my fellow party crasher was none other than my co-worker and faithful reader SH. (We laughed about this today, so I don't think she'll mind me telling the story; actually, it's something we're quite proud of.) As I said, we left at about midnight and drove about two minutes up the street to a local Catholic church's party where a longtime friend of our family was playing. It's not like we snuck in or anything; we just walked through the door, listened to our friend's band for a couple of songs, visited with her and then we went back home. There was no harm done - it's not like we ate their food or drank their liquor or anything; we just listened to the band for a few minutes, that's all. But it was fun, and will definitely be a New Year's Eve I will never forget.