WHETHER I SINK OR SING

I was right. The telly went on. Robbie Williams appeared, looking self-satisfied behind a microphone. I have no clue what he was singing - every other line he got the audience to sing for him, which of course, being the kind of people who had paid through their noses to be there, they did, without even a hint of indignance. Then Robbie high-fived a corridor of worshippers as he sang his way out onto the BBC balcony that overlooks Westminster and the London Eye.

I unfurled the strip of paper which I had (1) just written on, and (2) curled up around a pencil. In bright capital letters I had printed my hopes for 2017. I had stapled it to a bauble, ready to go away with the Christmas decorations next week. I wondered whether I had set myself up for disappointment again.

Robbie Williams bragged to the nation that he had given up cigarettes. The other presenter congratulated him, wearily, as though he'd been hearing that since 2005, and then introduced the 'spectacular' fireworks and 'awesome' soundtrack.

And that was that. The gigantic seconds went down, the crowd proved as one that they had mastered counting backwards, and then fireworks filled the sky above the wheel for fifteen minutes. I clutched my bauble, thinking, praying and wondering why it felt so out-of-sync with the rest of the world. We talked about whether there were people on the London Eye, whether the tubes would be running, how much the fireworks were likely to have cost and who pays for them. Then, eventually, the camera swept across the crowd filling the embankment with their smartphones in the air, and cut back to Robbie, who started singing Angels as though he were being haunted by the ghost of 1997.

We switched off.

It's up to me, I suppose, whether that little strip of paper will make my heart sink next Christmas. I almost didn't want to do it, but as with most things like that, I quickly realised that I should. It focuses the heart and crystallises the mind, in theory leading to positive action. In reality though, I will forget the specifics of what I wrote, perhaps even that I wrote it at all, until a jolly Saturday in December. Whether I sink or sing probably depends on how much I really want to see it happen.

We packed away the dominoes, cleared up the silly string and spent-party-poppers, and we spirited the empty glasses away to the kitchen. Then I went home with cold hands in my pockets. It wasn't until later that I realised one finger was bleeding. The sight of the red blood, smudged down my hand made my head swoon. I carefully fished inside my coat pocket to try to figure out what had happened.

One by one I pulled out fragments of broken bauble.