Thursday, January 11, 2007

The New Year...

Like the condensation of human exhilaration, fireworks rained down on Dakar…it’s the dawn of a New Year. How distant my last New Year’s eve celebration now feels. I had enjoyed two parties in Washington D.C., indulging myself in graceful company as though I had a crystal ball into this New Year.

This time around, other than the crackling fireworks raining down indiscriminately from above, I am and feel truly alone. In a new city, which I barely know, I am surrounded by the echoes of an empty apartment. Echoes sporadically punctuated by those jubilant fireworks. When I make that long distance phone call home, which temporarily eschews me from solitude, I hear my voice bounce off the walls of my yet-to-be-furnished-apartment. I am left to wonder whether my interlocutor on the other end of the line can also hear my words of solitude.

How does one make a resolution under these conditions? What kind of resolution emerges from the conflagration of echoes and silence? I can only resolve to…gotcha!!!