I really hope that it’s not true about what people say about how you spend your new years sets the standard for how you’ll spend your year.

I spent the first minutes of the new year completely alone. The sounds of people counting down from ten roused me from my semi-conscious state in the corridor outside the room we were staying in. I was waiting for someone to come with the key and let me in. I’d lost my friends on the beach in Lorne two hours ago.

I’d been getting some sweet nye hooks and turned around and they were gone. The guy I was with had also lost his friends. We walked around together for a bit trying to find our respective mates. I kept saying to him “look for a curly girl and a tiny Indian”. I’m not sure if he could understand anything I was saying, as he was an exchange student and Australian wasn’t his first language. He was from Ireland, but we had a lot of trouble with communication. We resorted to hooking up to fill in any uncomfortable silences. I’m not sure what his name was but I called him Simon. We couldn’t find any of our friends, so he took me back to his place. All of the doors were locked and his host parents weren’t home. So we went to where I’d been staying. Same situation over there. We just sat outside the room for a while. We gave up on conversation entirely after a bit and just made out and such to fill the time. Some time along the way I had become very drunk and started to feel ill. Simon got me some water and sat with me for a bit. A bit before midnight he left to go find his host family.

I heard the countdown and the cheering and the fireworks but I couldn’t see them or muster the energy to move from my position outside the room. It was the first time that I hadn’t had a kiss at midnight. I felt awful physically and emotionally. Not because of the no kiss thing, just because it was a terrible way to start a new year; sick and alone. Shortly after, my friends found me. They’d been looking for me for hours and were relieved to see me but angry that I’d gotten lost and not gone to our designated meeting area (I’d forgotten about it). They put me to bed and went out again. I woke up about nine hours later with a shocking hangover and we left Lorne.

To celebrate the first day of 2012, I munted on the Great Ocean Road. You’re welcome, Australia. Have a good one.