What Do We Call This Year?

So we popped corks, watched a ball drop on TV, watched Dick Clark need a chair, heard the fireworks, listened to the conch shell be blown….(it’s a  Caribbean tradition and a sketch being started ), and made the usual hasty boo boos in writing the first checks of the new year.

But we still don’t know what to call it or how to welcome the decade. For the past nine years it’s  been two thousand one, two thousand two,  two thousand nine and now?

Now what is it? Twenty-oh ten? Twenty ten? Two thousand and ten? Two thousand ten? It’s unchartered is what it is. We’ve no precedent for how to say it so maybe it will sort itself out or maybe it will go the way time telling has gone. Pre- digital watch wearers told you the time as ” twenty to two “. Now ask anyone wearing a digital watch what time it is and you’ll be told ” one forty “.  Or if you’re in the company of a military person, you might have to take out your abacus and calculate that oh sixteen thirty means you missed your plane.

Or as Carol has mused over, we could still be using Roman Numerals.

Or just say what my elder friend says with a look of fed up disgust when told that something needing fixing will ” take time “.  ” Crap “, she says, ” I don’t have time for time “.

Well anyway you say it, the new year has trotted in and schlepped along with it, a new decade.

Let’s agree that no matter how we say it, read it, or write it, we’ll all do our part to improve some small acreage of this planet we live on.

Because from her head to her crazy toes, Cloud is making the world a much prettier and sweeter place. Let’s follow her lead.

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27 Responses to “What Do We Call This Year?”

  1. Donald Diddams Says:

    Well, I just happened over here, and here’s something new! The first Luria pictures from 2010. Love the conch blower sketch — and I assume a soon-to-be painting? It has to the potential to be a real winner. So Happy New Year, Bonnie, and yes I resolve to spiff up my little piece of it! Give that pink bellied Cloud a scratch for me.

  2. Carol King Says:

    I’m going with 20-10 or twenty ten. Or XX – X in a modified Roman Numeral sort of way. (No MMX for me!)

    Love, love, love the sketch and I can’t wait to see it as a painting. But it stands alone as a sketch as well. Your lines are fabulous!

    Is Little Cloud getting PINKER???? I think so! Maybe it portents that 2010 will be ROSY.

    xoxo

    • Bonnie Luria Says:

      Carol- sometimes I need to remind myself to draw when painting gives me the horrors. Glad you like it so far. I’m going to consider it done and might try to paint it too.

      Cloud does seem to be getting pinker AND cuter. She is a living teddy bear and snuggles in the bed, while making little happy moaning sounds.
      I believe she was constructed by toy making elves and then zapped with a pulse.

  3. judylobo Says:

    I am either going with 20-10 or 50-70 depending on whether I am looking at the Jewish calendar or the Gregorian calendar. Cloud is beautiful no matter what year it is.

  4. Noel Luria Says:

    Yes, I too, had to sacrifice a check, although, I do wish the check was paid last year and not this one. Love you Mom.

  5. w1kkp Says:

    I’m delighted to see that new drawing! Yea! I wish I could photograph conch shells’ insides. I’d like that more than cloud’s nose is this heresy to say? That dog is magical other worldly looking… but the nose looks a bit too earthly for me in 2thousand10!

  6. Melinda Says:

    My vote is for 20-10, but it may take awhile before we settle in to it.

    Your baby dog is doing more for world peace right now than anyone I can think of! And, your sketch is energetic, strong and thoughtful. Hmm. This is the way I think of you and your life in all that blue.

    Have a very happy, inspired, healthy new year!!

    • Bonnie Luria Says:

      Melinda- thanks for your sweet words. I’ll tell her she now has an addendum to her CV- world peacekeeper. I think she’s up to the task.

      I wish you all the same in twenty ten!

  7. Wreggie Says:

    Twenty ten in this family.

    I have a conch horn I made. Darn shell is very hard. I wasn’t informed about the tradition.

  8. Marian Fortunati Says:

    Cloud probably “nose” what to call it!!

    Reading about the conch reminded me of my visit in Y2K to the Conch Republic…. “we seceded where others failed”. Lovely part of the world that you live in.
    After visiting Key West and other nearby spots, my daughter and her boyfriend (now husband) headed off to the everglades to be with thousands of her best friends for a muddy PHISH concert. My husband and I celebrated the most feared new year much more sedately in Miami.

    Happy New Year, Bonnie!

    • Bonnie Luria Says:

      Ah Marian- didn’t we all wait with frightened breath to see what would implode, deflate, collapse and generally fail? And nothing.
      Well, I like nothing. I’m a big fan of nothing.

      Happy New Year to you too Marian and despite what I just said, here’s to everything!

  9. w1kkp Says:

    Seriously? Those are the “wacky dew claws”? Bon Bon, I thought it was her rear end and tail!

    Me not so good in animal department.

  10. Sharon Crute Says:

    Wonderful, confident lines full of movement. I love drawings.

    Funny how some things parallel with us…you with Cloud and myself with Dave.

  11. Bonnie Luria Says:

    Thanks Sharon- I have to come by your blog and have a look because FB is like an appetizer but your blog is the full buffet.
    For you, the line up is : New Year, New Decade, New Gallery!
    Way to go forward my Floridian friend in the frost.

  12. Jala Pfaff Says:

    Awesome sketch!!

    Oh Cloud Puppy, Cloud Puppy! How cute thou art. Thou art art.

    Happy new year…
    Funny, I’ve been saying “twenty-ten” without ever giving it a thought.

  13. planetross Says:

    Happy New Year.

    My uncle died on the 31st of December: it’s not sad, it’s what happens when you get creaky up to 90. He was a wheat farmer and a very good one. He only has one child.
    His nextdoor neighbour (10km away) is a dairy farmer: he has 8 kids. When the oldest got married my uncle bought a new farm for him. I think originally it was a loan, but after a few months he just gave it to him.
    I want to do that. … all that “pay forward” stuff.
    That’s my new year’s resolution: do random acts of kindness and see where it leads … or never knowing … I don’t really need to know.

    I’m selfish … if it makes me feel good. I’m selfish.

    note: it’s twenty ten for me.

    double note: I don’t why I’ve said this here: I just did.

    • Bonnie Luria Says:

      Ross, I saw the movie Pay it Forward for the first time last month and aside from moments of sappiness, I was taken with the notion of being extravagantly generous.
      Your uncle left a good legacy for you to follow. It’s like the stories I’ve read of people who pay the toll for the unknown car behind them.

      Have you tried to do a good deed and not tell anyone about it? That’s a challenge.

      Sad to lose a family member on the eve of a new year.

  14. Samartdog Says:

    Howdy and happy new year (with a lazy eye to the future, I’m calling it twenty-ten).

    By way of introduction, blame this on Jala. She lives across the street, we criticize each other, I love her dogs, and she said (accurately) that you’re funny. You are. I’ve also heard you mentioned by that paragon of yucks, Bill (WR) Jones; I’ve also seen your comments on his blog.

    I like your art. This sketch of the conch-blower is pretty wonderful. Your recent paintings of locals and your post about jumbies also struck a chord. I spent the last ? decades painting black women who became sisters after riding my easel for so long. When I’m able, I’ll post some of them.

    And I had a pretty white dog like Cloud, named Cuba.

    Check my blog and see some of why I’m a slow starter. When I next get the chance, I plan to go like hell.

    • Bonnie Luria Says:

      Howdy back Sam and thanks for the splendidly generous things you wrote.
      Jala is funny, you are funny, I am funny- it’s a perfect conjugation of the word. Oh and that WR- he’s insane.

      I’ve read your comments on Jalas blog too. And I’d be so very interested in seeing those paintings you’re describing.
      Dogs we have in common- and more than you realize. My other dog, star in a supporting role on this blog, is named Cuba too. Yes, that’s right.
      We pronounce it Kooba but it’s spelled Cuba. For the little bacuba bananas that grow here.
      Here being an out island as I see you’ve spent some time on too.

      Now it looks like you have a supporting cast of your own. Hope you can go like hell, soon.

      So glad you took the time to poke out such a nice long comment. Come back again soon.
      Thanks.

  15. Wreggie Says:

    Yes soon come. Feb 7.

  16. wrjones Says:

    That drawing will morph into a wonderful painting to start the 2010, 20&10, two thousand ten year.

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