A few of the choices I’ve made over the years stand out. In the Virginia Avenue days, one of the neighbors always threw a party. I alternated between incoherent revelry, moderation, and abstinence at those parties. The memorable ones were the abstinence parties. Watching your friends advance into personal chaos is far more entertaining than accompanying them on the trip. The mornings after you've abstained, when you go visiting your friends to witness the aftereffects, are highly entertaining, too.
Staying off the roads, at least after, say, nine o’clock, is an absolute must. One year, I visited a family party on the west side of Chicago and departed early enough to make it home before midnight but late enough to share the roads with well oiled revelers. After numerous harrowing, breathtaking experiences, I made it home in one piece and resolved to never again tempt fate on New Year’s Eve.
Another unique New Year’s found my wife and I in the party mecca of the Midwest, Winneconne, Wisconsin. It was a viciously cold day, not unlike what we’ve experienced here lately, and on this night a blizzard had seized control of the proceedings. Our friend Doug Nelson had acquired the Talk of the Town Tavern that year, adding it to the resorts he already owned in Winneconne. For the night’s entertainment, Doug had hired the music teacher from the grade school to play piano. Strike the mental image you just got of a gray haired spinster, she was a party girl who could really play—a decision that would prove fortuitous, for as the night progressed, the entire town was plunged into blackness. We learned later that one of the local drunks had failed to recognize a curve and launched his pickup into a rather important electrical transformer. Doug found candles, dozens of candles from who knows where, and the piano required no electricity. The rest of the joints in town needed electricity for their juke boxes and the amps for their bands, i.e. "party over" for them. The Talk of the Town, on the other hand, turned into a candle lit oasis, and the piano player’s tip jar was brimming. The other places in town emptied out and The Talk of the Town filled up, packed ‘till closing time.We stayed that night in one of Doug’s motel units, one that was customarily a summer place, and jammed towels under the door to keep the blizzard out, and held each other close to maximize warmth. It was a singularly spectacular night, unique and fun.
For a few years, we made a habit of dinner with friends, revisiting The Old Barn in Burbank one time, experiencing the now demised Greek offering from Lettuce Entertain You one time (gaining an understanding of why it’s life was short) and hitting White Fence Farm for Manhattans and fried chicken a couple of times, always early enough to avoid the lunatics.
Lately, friends join us for cocktails and hors d’oeuvres and we turn on the Channel 7 New Year’s show to see what kind of bad dress Janet Davies will have this year. We keep the night really low key.
It’s hard to get excited about anything else after you’ve spent New Year’s Eve in Winneconne, you know.
