Nothing changes on New Year’s but the date, and that only because of arbitrary accommodation of astronomy to Roman festivals, politics and bureaucratic convenience. But no matter; arbitrary or not, it’s a good occasion for us to make some changes. A time for self-centering.

Anyone who has seriously attempted it knows the impossibility of representing past events authentically, as they were lived and felt by the people involved. …. People then just didn’t think the way we do.