Buzzing around Yorkshire, our columnist’s days are never the same….
Well hello 2024! That came round fast! Where did 2023 go? How can we be almost a quarter of a century into another century already? It only seems a minute since we celebrated the end of the last millennium, Year’s Eve 1999 and I’ll be honest, if someone says ‘20 years ago’ to me I think they mean the 1980s. It’s a bit of a shock to realise they’re talking about 2004.
We have a family saying when we take down the Christmas decorations in early January – someone always pipes up: ‘Before you blink it will be going up again!’ I think it’s partly to combat the post-Christmas blues and the prospect of a sober, dismal January, but, as we pack our decorations away this time, we know that 2025 will soon be hurtling towards us.
It’s a fact that life seems to speed up as you grow older whereas 12 months to a 10-year-old feels like a lifetime. I remember singing along to the Sheffield band Pulp’s famous lyrics: ‘Let’s all meet up in the Year 2000... won’t it be strange when we’re all fully grown?’ The year 2000 felt an age away back then. So how did we get to 2024 already and, while we’re on the subject, why do I still not feel fully grown?
The year 2024 isn’t quite as we expected either. Back then we envisioned a futuristic world where we’d all be wearing silver Star Trek-y jumpsuits, popping meal replacement pills instead of eating real food and driving cars on invisible highways in the sky (Back to the Future-style).
In reality, apart from the obvious change; smart phones, social media, the all-powerful world wide web and no proper banks on the high street (grrrr) – things don’t look so very different. Hey 1980s shoulder pads are even back in which is great because I still have the originals!
My much-missed in-laws Dorothy and Tommy spent most of the last years of their lives living in Spain. When we asked them why they moved to sunnier climes Dorothy said: ‘We needed to slow time down’. I was intrigued then, but I totally get it now, and although I really love my busy life in Yorkshire – how do we slow time down if an easier pace of life on the Costa Del Sol isn’t an option? A quick Google (Yep, the internet for instant answers really is the one big thing that has transformed the last 30 years) throws up some interesting solutions.
One piece of advice is
