Money spider on Daniel�s face on the first of January, and another one on the second. That�s got to be good luck if you�re a believer. I think I might be, for now.

I guess I�m not going to write about Christmas. The moment has passed and whatever I write down now will feel stale. But I will try to summarise�

Christmas Eve we spent at mum�s place. There are �issues� and terrible secrets on that side of the family, so most of the family isn�t talking and probably never will again. I didn�t believe or understand this until I found out what happened, and now I�ve come to accept that I should not expect to have my extended family on mum�s side around very often. Too much history, and hardly any of it to do with mum. But there was my mum, her parents (tiny Italian grandmother, big loud German grandfather, both fitting neatly into the stereotypes you might be imagining), her one brother still on speaking terms and his second wife, my sister and her boyfriend, and my dad. Dad�s famliy lives a couple of hours away so we don�t see them often.

My uncle is weird. Acts as though Daniel and Matt (my sister�s boyfriend) are not there. Just like that, thin air. Mum thinks it�s some sort of jealousy, as he has always been jealous of her since they were children, and maybe now he thinks that we are doing better than his own kids are. His son, my cousin, committed suicide a few years ago, threw himself off a bridge onto the road below. Maybe that has something to do with it too. I don�t really know what his problem is. His wife is nice, very friendly and easy to talk to. I have decided to play innocent and act as though I haven�t noticed my uncle�s childish behaviour towards Daniel (or Matt). I�m not about to give anyone on that side of my family anything to hold against me. They can be a weird and bitter lot, so I have decided that any resentment they may have towards me is going to be their own problem. I will not be the cause of it. They will not have me to blame.

Anyway, to hop off that tangent and back to my circle, it was nice overall. Exchange of gifts went well, despite my initial concerns. Budget restraints grace � the home loan, and all the associated costs that go with the being-grown-up-and-independent turf, like bills � water, electricity, council rates, strata levies, car rego, medical bills� like Blackadder once said, I feel like a pelican. Every which way I turn there�s always an enormous bill in front of me. Other costs too. Food, house paint, random assortments of new and surprising requirements each week. This meant that our budget was a bit tighter than usual over Christmas, but all went well in the end.

Christmas Day at Daniel�s parents� place with half of his family there. They do a lucky dip for presents � you buy a generic �girl� or �boy� present and put it in the pile, then everyone�s name goes into a hat. When your name gets drawn out you get to pick a present. This year was slightly different � we all had to write little poems. The poems were drawn from a hat and read out, we all tried to guess who wrote it, and the author of the poem got to pick a present. I had a silly apron and a pair of green foam antlers forced upon me, and I was nominated as Santa�s helper. I looked ridiculous and kicked up a big fuss (mostly for show), but really I didn�t mind. I guess I�ve wriggled my way into the family far enough that I get to be the butt of jokes now. It�s a badge of honour.

Christmas night at his uncle and aunt�s place with a lot of his younger cousins there. They do a �Secret Santa� where you are told who you are buying for. Also fun. We had two Santa Clauses, and hence a couple of upset and confused children.

Boxing Day at his parents� place again, with some of the same people as the day before, and some people from the other side of the family. They do a Boxing Day lucky dip too. Poems again. I was a little miffed because it felt a bit forced the second time round and I had no idea what to write. I came up with something at the very last minute, just as everyone was gathering round for the gift-giving ceremony, and stuffed it into the hat. It turned out to be the first one drawn out, and went down pretty well (I included a bit of a family Boxing Day in-joke). Daniel�s aunt (his dad�s sister) was Santa�s elf this time. She had wanted the job, and seemed to enjoy ringing Santa�s bell loudly and frequently.

I guess that covers Christmas.

We had no plans for New Year�s Eve so at the last minute we started to invite people round to our place. We were surprised that so many people agreed to come. I guess nobody had made any real plans this year. We cleaned up the unit and got the barbecue ready, and it was a fairly low-key evening but nice. I got a phone call from V., a schoolfriend of mine, who I hadn�t thought was really listening when I said she could come over for New Year�s. She said she and her fianc� would be coming round, which made me happy. I realised that she hadn�t changed since school, though I�d thought she had. She�s still the same, and this made me happy too. One of my other friends has either changed, or has not changed at all. I can�t decide which. I mentioned her a few entries back, the one who wouldn�t let me use the staff toilet even though there was nobody else in the store at the time, and it was night-time and I just really needed to pee. I guess most people get a bit more laid-back as they grow older, but she didn�t. Turns out that V. didn�t change� I think she just restrains herself around A. like I do. V�s hen�s night is coming up in a couple of weeks. Stallions Afloat, basically a night on a harbour cruise with buff men wandering round in their underpants serving us drinks. And a strip show. This was my clue that V. had not turned into a dull and submissive housewife after all. Of course A. isn�t going. I guess neither of us expected her to.

V�s fianc� is a nice guy. Twelve years her senior, but they seem happy together. He loves snowboarding too, so we always have something to talk about. She�s not much of a snowboarding fan herself. Says she�s tried it three times and hurt herself three times. I guess there�s no telling some people that them�s the rules. No pain, no gain, and all that pallaver.

I like saying "pallaver".

She broke her wrist the first time, so I guess she wasn�t wearing wrist guards. I always wore wrist guards when I was learning. I think I would have broken my wrists too � on several occasions � if I hadn�t. Lots of clumsy falls and landing on wrists. It's what beginners do.

Around 11:30PM we all wandered down to the beach, chatting and laughing and waiting for the fireworks. We usually get a good view of the Sydney fireworks from Cronulla but this time we saw nothing. Well, except the little fireworks display put on by the locals, which was still nice. We all lost each other but thanks to the wonder of mobile phones we managed to regroup.

On the way we must have wished half the population of Cronulla a Happy New Year. A lady had a little boy, about four years old, and was telling him to give everybody high-fives. He seemed to be loving it. Everybody was everybody else�s friend, even though we�d never met before. Young and old, �Happy New Year!�

I called my family on my mobile at midnight too.

I found Daniel last of all, and asked him where my New Year�s kiss was. So he gave me a raunchy pash right there on the beach.

Some of the guys decided to go for a swim. Daniel initially decided that he wasn�t going to be one of them. So his dripping wet friends chose to chase him. He ran like a chicken when a fox enters the coop. I�ve never seen him go so fast, or change directions so nimbly. It was kind of sexy because I�ve never really seen him run, but he�s surprisingly quick and I was impressed. In the end he stripped down to his undies of his own volition and went in the water with the other two. The three of them seemed to have bought their undies at the same shop because they were all wearing identical black boxer briefs. Cute.

A few of us came back to our place later on. Stayed till 2:30AM, just having a talk and a laugh. I�d fulfilled my goal of being relatively sober by the end of the night, instead of puking into a shrub like last year.

We all got slaughtered last year. I must have blacked out for a while, because I remember waking up on the footpath, wondering where everyone was and whether I'd simply been left behind. I turned around and Joel, one of Daniel's schoolfriends (the snowboarding buddy coming to Europe with us, as he has for the last couple of trips abroad), was there too. Asleep in a hedge. He's a pretty big guy, not fat but just big. Tall. Six-foot-four, ex-army, works in a mine - paid handsomely for it as he is an engineer there and gets to blow stuff up. He was slumped in the hedge as though it were an armchair. I've never seen anybody make a shrub look so comfortable.

This year, I think I only had three drinks all night, but I had a good time, made all the better because everything I experienced, everything I felt, was real. Nothing was the result of alcohol or other substances messing with my mind. Not that I�m a drug-taker, but an �e� or two was an option that I didn�t take. Partly because I forgot about it, partly because the others took them while I wasn�t there and never decided to come and get me, and partly because I don�t really need it to have fun. I�ve had it once before and it was like having a caffeine hit from a strong cup of coffee. A happy cup of coffee. Actually it made me laugh.

And alcohol� well, I think just about everyone knows what alcohol can do to your emotions. It can make you happy, but it can really bring you down too.

Anyway, after everyone left, Daniel and I sat inside together, listening to the music on his iPod for another two hours. He had had a bit to drink and wasn�t in an entirely legal state of mind, but he was lucid. He just had enough in him to be able to really enjoy the music in a way I�ve never seen before. We talked about this and that, and a lot about snowboarding and how great it would be to be on the snow again in the Alps, especially now that I can ride well, and keep up with him. We will finally be able to ride together. Plus a lot of the songs on the iPod remind us both of snow and good times anyway.

He paused now and then, in the middle of a sentence, to soak in the music at his favourite bits of songs, and then he�d continue. He told me a bit about some of the tracks he had on his iPod, explained what they meant to him and why he had them.

One of the songs from the Donnie Darko soundtrack � in my opinion one of the greatest movie soundtracks in existence � came on. �Mad World�. This time I was the one who paused in the middle of the sentence, and said, �I love this song.�

He stopped too, and we just listened to it together. We tried to continue the conversation but the song just kept stopping us. When it finished he got up and put it on again.

He sang.

I can�t put down in words how much this meant to me. I always sing along to songs. Daniel never sings. He feels uncomfortable singing, and it just isn�t something he does. Ever. Once he got really drunk after his grandfather's funeral before we were going out, and warbled a song down the phone at me for a laugh, but that wasn�t anything like this.

We were listening to the song, and he just started to sing.

I�m not going to pretend he turned into Luciano Pavarotti, because he was out of tune half the time, probably due in part to the alcohol and tiredness. But I didn�t care. He was singing, and the song was beautiful and the moment was so touching. I was tired too, and I found myself fighting back tears.

What a moment. What a start to the year.

I decided there and then that this year would be different. It�s going to be a good year, a year of change. Maybe it will be the year that we start to plan a wedding, but I�m not going to push that issue too much. When he eventually asks me, I want it to be his idea, not just the result of a successful nagging session on my part. So I�m trying to be patient, despite all the weddings going on around me. Around us.

I hadn�t made any resolutions by the time midnight came around, but since then I think I have formulated a few. I only hope I can stick to them.

1. In my relationships, I will give more and take less.

2. I will be more patient. I will not �pick fights� when I am cranky.

3. I will open up more to my friends and to the people around me. I�m crappy at opening up. I just never realised it before. I sometimes wondered what was wrong with my relationships with friends � we got along of course, but something seemed to be missing. It�s me. I keep my feelings to myself. I might go so far as to let on that I�m upset about something, but I never talk about it. I will try to change this.

4. I will get Daniel to ask me to marry him� and make him think that it was his idea :)

Those seem like fairly simple resolutions, but whether I manage to keep them is another thing.

I want to remember something, so I need to write it down.

New Year�s Day was hot. It was fucking hot. Forty degrees Celsius, dry like an oven. There was a �breeze� for a little while, but that was just as hot, and even drier. It was only there to taunt us. There was no relief. We have a fan at home, no air conditioning. So we sought refuge at his parents� place, where there is air con and a pool. The water was soupy but still better than the baking sun. A change came over that evening, and the winds were insane, so we stayed the night. Went to bed, turned the lights out; it was black. I started kissing his neck, shoulders� letting my hands roam�

� until the sentiment was returned.

I can�t find a way of describing it in a non-detailed way and without using cheesy words like �special�, but that�s what it was. I whispered, �I love you,� so quietly that I thought he could not possibly have heard it, but he whispered back, �I love you too.�

We slept pretty soundly.

It�s going to be a good year.