on january

though I am now generally disillusioned with the accepted behavioral patterns that come and go with various recurring calendar dates, there is still some ephemeral sense of renewal that comes with a new year and a new journal. maybe it is a good thing to have some fixed interval, like a year, to use as a UNIT for dividing life up into chunks. the year is long enough to where a lot can change, and short enough so many things stay the same. each year, everyone completes another lap around the sun,,: a cosmic event perceptible to us through the cycle of the seasons and now directly measurable with technology.. though the definitions of "start" and "end" of this continuous cycle are arbitrary. so while there is nothing particularly significant about the concept of "january" outside of human affairs, i do see utility in that sense of renewal; it leads one to set goals, making changes to habits whose inertia demands significant motivation to redirect. it is notable that the human mind can be motivated by such an abstract concept.. to want to change its own habits, and to be better about doing so at a certain time of year