Ascending Winter, 1, 1816
The end of the Harvest period is today. Matthew and Tyler decided to stop by with Gavner and show us a few things. They called it ‘New Year’s’, the day that the previous year ended and the next year begins. Where they come from, the people throw a giant party celebrating this ending of the year. I must say, his people are weird.
Espoir loved the party though, so I may decide to make it a yearly thing. Tyler and Espoir have grown immensely close with her, it’s almost as though he treats her like his daughter. The party began with games. It was fairly easy to catch on; Matthew took a stack of cards and handed them out to each player. The point of the first game was to have the fewest points on the table. Each player got four cards, picked two and looked at them. When it was your turn you would pick a card from the top of the stack and if it was worth fewer points than one in your hand you would exchange it. If not you would put it down. If the person ahead of you put down a low scoring card in the stack, you could take it and replace it with one of your two cards face down. I think he called it something like ‘Polish Poker’ maybe.
Espoir was very good at this game, or maybe it was just luck; either way she won… a lot. She was so happy, we even made bets and she took all the money at the end. I love seeing her so happy. At one point she would win and cheer, standing up and rubbing it in. We all just laughed when she did this.
At about ten, Gavner brought in the meat, cheese, and crackers. This was apparently another tradition for Tyler. He would slice the meat, it was a deer, into smaller pieces and slice the cheese into small squares. Put the meat and cheese between two crackers and you had a very tasty snack, though they insisted it was the meal, I was still a bit hungry and had to sneak some more food of my own.
Once we were all full, Matt and Tyler had decided we were going to have a fire. The snow had not yet started falling so Gavner and I agreed and we all searched for firewood. Matt and Gavner spend ten minutes trying to light the fire, but eventually they accomplished that. Espoir grew cold quickly and had to sit by the fire to warm up. We spent the next hour telling stories and staying warm.
“Okay guys, there’s about ten minutes left,” Matthew said before midnight. “When it gets to midnight we all have to shout ‘Happy New Years.’” Gavner and I thought this was weird but agreed. We waited and waited, and then Matt and Tyler started counting.
“Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one, Happy New Years!”
We all held up our glasses of wine, (Espoir had grape juice) tapped glasses, and drank. Espoir went to bed shortly after because she was so tired, and the rest of us stayed up through the night, talking and sharing stories. This is one tradition that I think we will carry on for the rest of our lives.
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