The predictability of January (a reflective post, as the first in January predictably are!)

The severe predictability of Christmas and New Year, and life in general can depress me a bit sometimes.  As much as the aforementioned Christmas and New Year are Good Things for catching up with friends and family and for contemplating your life plans (how can anyone help being that self-indulgent in late December/early January?!) it's all just so...well, predictable.  A 'Weight Watchers' ad on 1st January is enough to make me want to bite through the walls in rigid frustration (though that may be more to do with the cheesiness of said ad, and I thought Weight Watchers were supposed to avoid high-fat foods - boom boom tishhhh!  Thank you, I'll be here all week...)

I'm only thirty-four so goodness knows what I'll make of all this samey-ness in another thirty-four years.  One of the things that scares me the most about getting really old is abject boredom.  This feeling was compounded when I read Diana Athill's autobiography 'Somewhere Towards the End' in which she talks about the fact that she doesn't really enjoy books much because she's heard all the stories before; knows how they're all going to end almost as soon as she picks them up.  This is probably why I crave idiosyncrasy, both in myself and others.  And it's also probably a huge reason why I want to write; though I haven't got the hang of 'not being boringly predictable' as a writer yet.  I think that by the time I get to about ninety-six (the great thing about writing is that you can do it at ninety-six! - and by then I shall be dictating all my novels whilst draped in red satin and eating chocolates, a bit like that Barbara Cartland-y character Matt Lucas played in 'Little Britain') my novels will have achieved a perfect blend of an enthralling story and a perfectly unexpected, idiosyncratic ending.  Though I suspect that my readership will still consist of: me and a few of my friends, and at ninety-six numbers will be dwindling so I suppose I'd better get a move on, really.

So does that mean "write more that's not rubbish" will be one of my New Year's Resolutions?   Errr...no.  I have discovered over the years that I rebel quietly and politely but irritatingly doggedly against my own rules just as quietly, politely and irritatingly doggedly as I rebel against other people's, so it seems I'm a bit better off just trying to trick myself into doing the things I want to do.  That sounds a bit weird, doesn't it?  But somewhere in my own mind it makes sense.

In the meantime I have no need to stop smoking, lose weight, reduce my drinking or master the art of flower arranging. But I have high hopes for January 2013, so watch this space.