BY ISAIAH FRIZZELL
New Year, new phone, who’s this? (Joke)
What will 2024 bring? Oodles and boodles of snow so you can slay the slopes? Fresh romance? A new child? We have so much to be grateful for in Blaine County. How do we celebrate?
Many will be with family, while a good portion will join up with friends, and there’s a few things to do around the Valley.
If your fashion game is on point, you might want to check out the New Year’s Eve Snow Ball at River Run Lodge for only $125 per person! You’ll have a chance to sip champagne, detonate the dance floor and hopefully share a special kiss at midnight. There’s also New Year’s Eve night skiing from 6-9 p.m. at Carol’s Dollar Mountain Lodge in Sun Valley.
There’s an ’80’s New Year Bash at Whiskey Jacques’ on Main, an online breathwork and sound healing experience called 9D “No Ordinary” New Year Transformation Healing and Wellness Event, and A Sun Valley Story at the Sun Valley Opera House where you can hear “a newly reimagined holiday celebration experience featuring the music of Colin Martin, Brooks Hartell, Brad Hershey and Jason Vontver.” (eventbrite.com)
Maybe you’d like to do some backcountry recreating with the elk, antelope and deer – oh my! Pack extra powdered water and some eggnog jerky. Maybe you’ll hang with the fam and watch the ball drop in New York City over the Internet in your Apple Vision virtual reality goggles. What a time to be alive!
Resolve et Coagula
One core tenet of the New Year’s tradition, in many people’s lives, are resolutions. A fresh Gregorian calendar start can inspire all the thoughts and hopes of making positive, beneficial changes in one’s life. What changes would or even should you make? Will you actually make those changes or is failure baked in and part of the joke? Do you have the power, the willpower to add to your life, fix something that nags at you and change for the better?
Willpower is mighty, real magic requiring discipline, foresight and, most of all, your own personal determination to follow through with integrity.
There’s an interesting correlation between New Year’s resolutions and a facet of most New Year’s parties. Quite often when resolutions are considered, discussed and decided upon we are laughing, partying, and more often than not, drinking. Alcohol has become the prime staple of most celebrations. Much money is made on this and nearly as much spent suggesting its consumption:
“Zenith expects alcohol advertising spend to reach £6bn (US$8.5bn) by 2023, surpassing its 2019 figure. Alcohol advertising is expected to increase in line with the ad market as a whole (4.9%), up 4% in 2022 and 5% in 2023.” (thespiritsbusiness.com)
And while we’re told that a little is good for the heart, reason and science show that too much is not good for anything. What’s a little and what’s too much?
The Sound of News
Do resolutions require a sound mind?
Another term for the product of alcoholic fermentation is ‘spirit.’ Even going back to the etymology of the name, alcohol purportedly has been around for as long as people.
“Residue from a beer-like,13,000-year-old fermented drink was recently unearthed in Israel, and evidence of a fermented drink of rice, honey, and fruit discovered in China dates to 7000–6600 BCE.” (sciencefriday.com)
How has this played out for society, communities, and families? On a gradient from net benefit to net detriment, where does the use of alcohol lie? For many it carries the insinuation of cheer, joy, celebration and laughter while for just as many, or one drink too many, it carries loneliness, confusion, sadness and anger.
What spirit will be involved in your New Year’s resolutions? Is it your will and yours alone that will produce the results of a lasting, positive life change?
The word alcohol is widely believed to stem, etymologically, from the Arabic “al-khul,” though there is sharp controversy among scholars as to whether this was meant to also describe a maliciousness that overcomes the one who imbibes. Regardless of the name, on that same note, when looking at statistics related to alcohol — at the physical, spiritual and moral degradation that afflicts so many — there is a strong correlation with causation of a destructive force.
“’– Alcohol is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality — Alcohol is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality, with harms related to both acute and chronic effects of alcohol contributing to about 5 million emergency department visits and more than 140,000 deaths in the U.S. each year.
–There is no perfectly safe level of alcohol consumption, as current research points to health risks including cancer and cardiovascular risks even at low levels of consumption, regardless of beverage type.
– Alcohol is a carcinogen associated with cancer of the oral cavity, pharynx, larynx, esophagus, colon, rectum, liver, and female breast, with breast cancer risk rising with less than one drink per day.
–The whole body is impacted by alcohol use — not just the liver, but also the brain, gut, pancreas, lungs, cardiovascular system, immune system, and more — and may explain, for example, challenges in managing hypertension, atrial fibrillation, diabetes, and recurrent lung infections. (niaaa.nih.gov) A rose by any other name?
Everything in Moderation, Including Moderation?
Pick your poison, it’s often said — is that meant to be taken literally? In the literary classic, Brave New World, one of the central characters in inexorably shunned both psychologically and socially from the book’s hyperengineered ‘utopia’ due to having alcohol accidentally splashed into his genetically modified birth serum. The results are horrific.
As adults, we’re reminded to “Drink Responsibly” and that is good advice. Whatever you choose to do this year, at least you’re doing it in Blaine County, Idaho. May mindfulness, consideration and expanded awareness be with you on this New Year’s celebration and likewise onward down the community corridors!
Happy Holidays!