Never Resurrect a Dead Year. Happy New Year.

Never resurrect a dead year. I learnt it the hard way.

I am going to tell you a story from 2013.

Two days after passing New Zealand, the Mhadei and I bid farewell to 2012 with the meagre resources I had on board, which were a packet of halwa from DFRL and the other half of a bar of Bourneville that had been saved from Christmas. Six hours into the New Year, we strode across the International Date Line and entered the Western Hemisphere from its west, causing a confusion in dates that was worse than the cacophony of five unsynchronised clocks.

A short-lived 2013 was struck off the logbook, and 2012 was raised from the dead to serve its last day again, which it did begrudgingly. The bilge pump quit soon after I made the first entry of the day in the log, and then the raw-water pump on the generator disintegrated. I replaced both with spares and was boiling water for dinner when the boat lurched, throwing me across its width to the leeward, along with the kettle scalding me with hot water. When 2013 arrived again at midnight, I heaved a sigh of relief and made my first New Year's resolution- never to resurrect a dead year. 

But the appearance of the new year so close to the International Date Line did have its record side. I became the first Indian to welcome 2013, and then crossed over to the other side to be the last Indian to see off 2012. We had two New Year celebrations, and even though the first appearance of 2013 was brief, it afforded me the unique opportunity to hold on to a New Year's resolution for the entire year of six hours.

The question that vexes me, though, is the extra day that I have lived, and if I must advance my birthday forever by a day.

But then the International Date Line is an imaginary line, and the New Year arrives on an arbitrary date. The record, therefore, was as ephemeral as the wake of my boat, which the sea was quick to cover.

What was real, though, was the boiling fury of the sea in that cold latitude. It was blowing a gale with winds topping in the early 50s, and the boat remained my priority. The celebrations could wait.

As we head into this New Year, I hope your resolutions last longer than six hours, but if they don't, I hope you have the spares on board to fix whatever breaks next.

To all those who read this, Happy New Year!