· · A NICE DINNER WITH A FEW FRIENDS AND IN BED BY 10
· · BINGE WATCHING NETFLIX NEAR A WARM FIRE
· · A CANDLE LIT YOGA CLASS
· · THE LATEST POD CAST OF ARMCHAIR EXPERT AND A CUP OF MULLED WINE
· · A WARM BATH, FACE MASK AND A GOOD BOOK
· · MIDNIGHT WALK UNDER THE STARS
If any of these plans remotely resemble your New Years Eve, I’ve got to tell you, you might be boring. I mean what happened to the days of sparklee clothes, nightclubs and DJ’s spinning well into the morning hours? When did we get to be so boring?
Let me tell you about boring, or shall I say, the exact opposite of boring. I just returned from 11 days in the Mid-West with my family, (but who is counting) where our schedule was packed from one event to the other. Last minute shopping, lunch here, dinner there and travel EVERYWHERE! We pretty much ate our way through the entire vacation. I’ve learned to hold off on drinking any Egg Nog prior to arriving, because I reach my weekly quota of all things fattening and nutrient deficient within the first 48 hours. Despite all the food and activity, none of it involves working out! Any downtime is spent playing cards with Aunt Janet or putting a puzzle together with Grandma and Grandpa.
What little downtime we had, was spent arguing with my daughter over why playing with the dollhouse my Father and I made over 30 years ago, that to this day still sits next the all the dolls and books, in the very bedroom I grew up in, is WAY cooler than making another meaningless Tic Toc musically on my cell phone. “Mom, I’m bored!” She cried as we wrestled for my phone on the wooden-post framed bed handed down to me in the early 90’s when my parents upgraded their bedroom set. Looking at the white walls above the radiator, my daughter points out the large crack running down the wall of the almost 100 year-old house. Walls I painted white myself, because I fancied myself a decorator in High School and black and white (a la “Nagel”) was all the rage.
“When I was your age, I sat in this very room and played for hours without any cell phone”. I told her.
“Mom when you were my age, cell phones didn’t exist, so you didn’t know what your were missing!” She replied. Which you can imagine what my comeback might have been!...
What is boring? I’ve learned being bored is in the eye of the beholder. What is boredom to one person could be very exciting to another. Take yoga for example. I can't tell you how many people have told me they find yoga boring. However for every one person who finds it boring, there are many others who absolutely love it and find it very exciting! In discussing this evenings plans with a group of 20 something year olds, they informed me their plan was to get together with friends, drink Glogg and listen to Pod Casts. I had to contain myself from laughing out, “Seriously?” When I was 20 I was dancing on revolving floors, pouring flaming shots down mine and my friends throats until we headed to the after party where we proceed to watch the sunrise. But they explained to me that, they are “done” with that scene. They would much rather enjoy an evening with friends, sharing stories and relaxing at home. (YAWN!...) No I kid, sort of. In hindsight, how cool is this? And it made me think, boring is the new exciting!
Tonight I will gather with family and a few friends, have a nice dinner and go for a bike ride on the beach with my family on New Years Day. There will be no club scene or sparklee clothes, although my daughter just asked if she could borrow my blue glitter eye-shadow and cell phone to play music for freeze dance, so there is that. Anywho, I couldn’t be more excited!! If you asked, was the smallest part of me slightly jealous of the couple in front of me in line at Whole Foods who were stocking up on bottles of water, ginger ale and “Party Smart” Himalayan Herbal supplements. The answer would be, Yes. But the other 99% of me was like “been there, done that”, and suddenly I realized I was so happy being “boring”. And after talking to my 20 year old friends, dare I say, I might even be a little "hip"?
Alisn Burmeister
For
Balanced Beauty