FEATURE
YEAR OF THE
THE LIGHTER SIDE OF NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTIONS BY GERRY BOWLER
S
o there you sit, the three of you. You, a responsible adult male, your wobbly belly which is so impressively grand that it requires its own postal code, and the calendar. You notice that it is December and that 2015 is drawing to a close. Inevitably, your mind turns toward that annual ritual of shame and humiliation: the New Year’s resolution. Soon you will feel compelled to examine your life and you will discover yourself to be a miserable failure in so many ways. The body that you once dreamed would take you to Olympic glory has turned into the chubbier twin of the Pillsbury Dough Boy. The Great Canadian Novel that you hoped to finish last year still consists of the opening sentence you scrawled on the back of a cocktail napkin. The treadmill (or NordicTrack or Nautilus
22 SEVEN JANUARY / FEBRUARY 2016
or Ab Rocket or ThighMaster or Sauna Suit, etc., ad nauseam) that you bought on credit with such optimism remains under a dust-covered tarp in the basement. The power tools that were purchased to create that oak rocking horse for your new grandchild…that overdue library book on becoming a successful at-home, online marketing millionaire…the tootight trousers that you swore you would fit into this year…the wasted Internet hours spent on fantasy football and Where Are They Now? articles about the cast of Saved By the Bell. You know how it goes, you pathetic schlub. So, undaunted by the gloom that has descended on the wreckage of your 2015, you vow that this year will be different! Come January, you will be an atomic steam-powered engine of change and activity. You will cast off the shackles