The Blackberry Walk

The month of January is oft maligned by detractors; but as someone whose birthday lies in January, I've grown to feel a certain patriotism for the month, and in this article I will defend the month. December is the month of Christmas, joy, and partying. The month is laced with Christmas meals, drinking, excitement that Christmas is around the corner, and great expense from Christmas shopping; but historically the time leading up to Christmas was never like this. December was a month of fasting - Christmas excitement, no doubt - but a time to go without, until the Christmas festival (FEASTival). The feast ought to be the climax of the fast, as a kind of release of the tension built up from avoiding rich foods for an extended time. The run-up to Christmas today, however, is far from a fast. I ended up tallying three Christmas feasts before Christmas day came. And by the time Christmas arrived, turkey, ham, stuffing, and brussels weren't quite as tasty and novel as they would've been. In fact, by Christmas day I felt quite stuffed and full. In my defence of January, you may ask, why do I speak so at length about December? My answer to that would be that December has short-changed poor January. The fast building up to Christmas day wasn't originally for a single day of feasting: it was for twelve days of feasting and no work, the twelve days of Christmas. Today, the twelve days of Christmas have been truncated in to a meagre seven days of Christmas up until New Years Eve which ends up being the most raucous celebration of the period. Somehow, January has been missed out. January has been reimagined as the month of sobriety (in the awful fad of 'dry January') and clarity, rather than drifted with style in from the year prior. That isn't to say that January can't be appreciated for its new role. Much like a Byzantine eagle, Janus is the Roman god with two faces; one face looks towards the new year, and another face looks towards the past year. It's a time to reflect on one's successes and failures in the past year, and set resolutions for the next. Alternatively, the two faces of Janus are the two directions the year could end up, cackling as they ask whether you'll enter the new year on the right footing or the wrong footing, if you'll stumble into greater sin, or be able to resist. January has this liberty within it, a kind of potential, owing to the year's youthfulness. This year is merely a baby; new goals and objectives can be set to become a better person this year than the last. "New year, new me". The twelve days of Christmas are the optimum time to unwind from a busy year, seeing the old year out and welcoming in the next. By the month of December, the year is an ailing old man, waiting to rest peacefully, waiting for the next infant year in the January of its life to take over. Simply then, January is the time of new beginnings. In the depths of winter, we're past the longest night, and its time to begin to think about how we'll spend the days of the new year. To analogise with football, its much like the transfer window between seasons, where teams buy an sell players to prepare for a strong year. Alternatively, for an analogy which my readers might resonate with more, its like the beginning of a HOI4 game, where you're designing unit types, and allocating your resources to production lines in preparation for the world war. However its spun, organisation and preparation has freedom and contains the germ of the times ahead. If you dread January, it follows that you'll dread the year ahead. If you dread January to the point of endless sighing and complaining, the time to fix and reorder your life is January.