For Auld Lang Syne
Should old acquaintance be forgot,
and never brought to mind?
Should old acquaintance be forgot,
and auld lang syne …
As the days in 2020 ticked down to zero, after the mistletoe and holly gave way to the liminal space that exists between the peak of December’s festivities and March’s necessary thaw, I found myself humming Auld Lang Syne almost every day. On the surface, that’s not terribly strange given how rapidly the new year was approaching.
What surprised me, though, was how often it wormed its way back into my head — normally, it’s classic New Year’s Eve fodder, a silly little diddy that is heard once or twice before the ball drops and the fresh breeze of a new start sweeps in. This year, it was everywhere; I found it in the garbage cans when I brought them to the curb; it snuck its way into my closet as I picked out shirts to wear every day; it must have even survived on my pillowcase because I often fell asleep with it in my ear and woke up to the melody rattling around my skull.
Auld Lang Syne is a peculiar song. It’s known to almost everyone but seldom understood. The meaning is so inconsequential that it barely merits a Google search, and even such an act returns few satisfactory results. It’s used, obviously, to bid farewell to the old and welcome the new with warmth and kindness. The Scottish phrase “Auld lang syne” roughly translates to the “old times” or “days gone by.” Sure. Makes perfect sense.
The parts that bug me, though, are the first two lines of the chorus, printed above — the bit of the song that’s belted out most frequently, and the section most synonymous with the New Year. When we say those lines, champagne flutes full and eyes misty, are we asking each other a question? Should old acquaintance be forgot, and never brought to mind? Or are we preparing for an eventuality — with the song telling us, “It’s right and necessary that the past be committed to memory, but in the event that old acquaintance should be forgotten, here’s some advice on handling the future?”
Maybe it’s a little bit of both. Maybe I was asking myself how I can possibly carry forward the immense weight of this year, while also reminding myself that it’s absolutely necessary that I do so. Maybe that’s why it wouldn’t leave my head.
This was the most demoralizing year of my life, both personally and for the hollowed-out shell of our society at large. It truly feels good to put this year in the past tense, because for the last nine months, all notion of time slipped away and left us speaking about the crushing necessity of existence permanently in the present, even if certain events actually happened a considerable time ago. Everything was now, everything was heavy, and everything was unbearably, unequivocally and irrevocably true.
As many others have, I could expel a laundry list of things that went sideways for me in 2020. I’m not interested in such measurements of futility, because they only serve to diminish the validity of another person’s experience in the hellscape that swirled around us. This year was not a fair-handed contest; it was a one-pony race that everyone bet on — and lost.
Our collective experience this year was an insurmountable loss of joy. That which made us smile with unbridled honesty and fulfillment was gone. Every laugh was twinged with melancholy, a sadness hidden in each outwardly pretty face. Theaters went dark. Stadiums fell silent. The dawn of a new decade was met with a stunning recoil of happiness.
There were things that made us happy in the short-term, of course. A phone call. An old movie. A new song. But life became a sputtering, staggering version of its former self. Talking about our lives this year before March — that very same liminal space we find ourselves in now — started sounding less like a hope for the near future and more like the kinds of things you’d say about your childhood: “Those were simpler times.” Times when joy was abundant, found at every corner, uninhibited by anything bigger. Those days gone by.
And in many ways, those two periods are similar. There is a loss of innocence that occurred in 2020 that seldom happens after adolescence. The world is colder and bristlier now than it was a few long months ago. The full absence of joy has left us permanently different, both physically and mentally, whether we realize it or not. And it does not matter if we ever fully realize the extent to which we have changed as individuals. All that matters is knowing that change exists.
At last, though, we can breathe a little easier, for that breeze that blows in every year is coming once again. The simple idea that better things are on the horizon is enough to keep solace until they actually arrive. We may not see the light yet, but we can feel the tunnel slowly widening.
So here’s to 2021, and the hope that our joy returns just as quickly as it left. May it bloom wildly, just as the darkness that took its place did. May it be left unchecked, just as our grief and sorrow were for so long. And by this time next year, I hope I’m writing something a little rosier — or maybe even nothing at all.
I beg that the old acquaintance that is 2020 is not forgotten. It must always be brought to mind, in one form or another. I sincerely hope that we take something from this bleak trip around the sun. I hope we hum the Auld Lang Syne forever, answering its questions and heeding its cautions.
