I don’t like January, that time after holidays when life tries to get back to a normal routine but somehow fails. At work, this is the beginning of a new fiscal year; in other words, work soars up after the December slowdown – the gear shift, although expected, still seems sudden and sharp.

That’s not a big deal for me. I ‘m happiest when I’m busy at work, although this year, due to some unexpected absences, I notice the heat more than before.

Like many others, I feel deflated after all the holiday hoopla. My family keeps Christmas on a very moderate level, focusing on its non-commercial aspects, but still. We also celebrate two Christmases, which doesn’t translate to two X-mas shopping and gift exchange by any means, but still involves some preparations, cooking, and going to the Orthodox Church on January 6th – the pinnacle of the holiday season for me.

January 7th is the end of Christmas season and then, every year, I know I have to face what I call my January blues. The first month of the year seems the longest as well. At work, there is no a long weekend until mid-February. Days are still short, barely noticeably longer than in December.

As a cherry on top, we had a couple of weeks of a brutal cold spell here – the temperature dropped below -35 C, which felt like -45 C with wind chill — an experience you feel you want to share you grandchildren one day.

And then, I heard some bad news. They’re not about my family nor me, thanks God — my painful and annoying issues with arthritis are ever present but stable — but still close enough to deeply affect me: a friend with some unclear CT scan results, another friend whose son went under serious medical treatment, a sudden, unnecessary and senseless death of my sister’s close friend, not the perfect post therapy outcome one of my girl-friends faced after an excruciating year of evasive therapies… At the same time, my sister is in Ottawa, my friends in Herzegovina, Croatia and New Zealand – not nearly close enough for any kind of direct and effective support.

On a bright note, my first read of 2024 was a wonderful, fresh, unusual romance novel, People We Meet on Vacation by Emily Henry. I really, really liked it.

It’s a slow read, something I don’t mind at all. It was just what I needed between the end of December and the beginning of January, when you don’t know what day or date it is. Although it follows the basic three-act structure of any other novel of any genre, the construction of it is subtle — not concrete blocks but a bamboo frame, so to speak. Lovely and intelligent writing as well, unhurried and measured built of the tension, believable, realistic, yet deeply moving and satisfying. So skilfully threaded I expected now and then for the story to end sad and heartbreaking. (Thankfully, the cover was reassuring). It captures the very essence of the best-friends-to-lovers experience, and you know it even if you have never fallen in love with your best friend. This is one of my most beloved subgenre of romance. In real life, this kind of love is not that uncommon, and I truly believe that such relationships have all the potentials to be the most stable and successful.

The other reason is pure personal. I wrote a novella with the same theme – a budding, confusing, irresistible love between two best friends. It was reassuring and confirming to see that someone who is a best-selling author on one side, and I on the other, have touched the same cornerstones of such a relationship. With no intent to compare myself with Emily Henry, I couldn’t help to see some kind of validation of my own work. Her novel, much longer and detailed, rose the same emotional tide I’d felt when I was writing my more condensed and time-contained novella, Best friends and Other Lovers. It told me, well, I did it right.

I hope your January is brighter than mine. After a four-month hiatus, I made a painting today, pouring onto the canvas my tangled and conflicting perception of January. It’s almost the end of it, so I try to look ahead.

How do you feel about January? Is it a common experience, or is it just me?

What was your last read of 2023, or the first read of 2024? How did you like it?