Did you survive Blue Monday? Rona did...

Day 21, Wednesday January 21, 11pm - Did TRSNYRC survive Blue Monday, the most depressing day of the year?

Apparently Monday was when the bad weather, the incoming bills, the credit crunch headlines and our collective failure to keep our New Year resolutions finally hit home. Everyone, as far as I understand, returned to their former ways, the gyms cleared of people, the pubs were filled to the rafters, everyone gorged on chocolate eclairs and we all returned to normal for the rest of the year.

Only time will tell what damage the TRSNYRC suffered. The club is due for its first meeting on February 7. Hopefully, someone will turn up.

Just for the record, we have about 45 members, at the last cursory count. I will try to produce an exact figure in the weeks to come. We have a presence in India, Australia and the United States. Our resolutions vary from the staple (lose weight, drink less) to the exotic (take a degree, learn a language, a musical instrument, restore a sailing boat, put on a one-man play, produce a sketch a day) to the bizarre and not immediately comprehensible (catch a 20lb pike, use left hand and left foot more often).

My favourite so far, though, comes from Rona, my cousin Mick's wife. They visited us last week. We had not seen them for 10 years, not since they moved to Australia. They're good sorts.

Rona, a French teacher, has MS and has spent a fair part of the last two years in a wheelchair. Her resolution? To stop being apologetic, when she holds people up or gets in their way or runs over their chiahuahuas or grandchildren. Rona, of course, is not disabled and never will be. Nor is she a victim, even if it's easy for her to believe it at times, when the rest of us fuss over her or talk to Mick as if she wasn't in the room. ("Does she take sugar?" Actually, Mick has a marvellous riposte to that. "I'll ask her," he replies. Then he says to Rona: "Do you take sugar?" And she replies to Mick: "No." And then Mick looks up and says with a sweet smile: "No, she doesn't.") No, Rona isn't disabled. She just moves a bit slower than she used to. But then, don't we all? Rona has other plans for 2009 which I know she'll share with us in due course.

I bet she didn't even notice Monday was blue at all. She was too busy getting on with things. And not apologising. At the moment, indeed, I find it hard to think of someone who has less need to say sorry, about anything. And don't you hate chiahuahuas and other people's grandchildren anyway?