And five, four, three, two, one… Happy New year's! As we close out 2025 and ring in 2026 I recall what for many of us is a shared childhood experience.
Which would be our parents lying about when midnight is on New Year's. For us the year that we found out about this was our second year in Minnesota. It was New Year’s Eve 2001.
For years my parents had my older sister convinced that when the ball dropped in New York City that it was New Year's. We, however, lived in the central time zone. So while it was the new year on the east coast it was only 11 PM where we were. Which yes is still late for a child, but it's so technically not midnight yet.
My parents kept this up for years. I was four years old the New Year’s 2001, and I had learned to tell time and about clocks that year.
A new skill that I applied that New Year's Eve by looking at the clock and informing everyone that it was not midnight. It was 11 PM. My parents' ability to put us to bed, and therefore be there themselves, before midnight was gone. And my nine year old sister realized that she had been bamboozled into going to bed early on New Year’s for years.
With that being said we did not get to stay up till midnight every year after that. We did some years, especially when we got to be older, but not every year.
