What? It does.
Since I was four my parents have coerced me into staying up WAY past my bedtime, then clinking a sippy-cup of Diet Sprite with them and a bunch of other adults while they all had champagne or beer when the clock struck twelve. Then, I was ushered back to bed with no further explanation. New year's eve wasn't something I really cared about until I was five.
December 25th, 2000, my grandmother told me that I would be allowed to have a toast with all the grown-ups this year from a big girl glass instead of a coffee mug like the year before.
Now, see, you think that sounds normal. Yet when I was five, mind you, I thought "a toast" meant "we will have toast." Real toast. At midnight. And when I was five, toast was my favorite food. I ate toast like a dog eats bacon. I seriously loved it.
So, of course, I got really, really excited for new years. My parents saw this new excitement and dismissed it that I was excited for the new year. But I wasn't. I was just excited for toast at midnight. I thought it was some sort of amazing feat to eat toast past bedtime and if I did it I would magically grow wings or something.
In preparation for this amazing, awesome occurance in my life, I went without toast for a whole six days (or however long it is from Christmas to New Years, I just woke up). This was super hard for me, but I thought it would be worth it in the end. I thought that this midnight-toast would be the most delicious toast EVER.
So, at 11:57 on December 31st of 1999, when I saw people pouring glasses rather than sticking bread in a toaster, I began to worry. And at midnight, when I was handed a glass of sparkling cider, I asked my mommy when we would be having toast. She told me that we were having it now and helped me raise my glass along with everyone else. I looked around and saw no toast. I asked again. She looked at me, confused, and I asked a third time.
She finally understood the question, and she slowly and calmly told me that there would, in fact, be no toast.
Then I cried.
For a few years they invited me down for New Years, but I never came down, instead I watched the fireworks from my room and brooded for five minutes. After a while I came down again, and now I always get super excited for my own New Years Toast.
And, yes, it is delicious.
