As ever, this New Year’s Day is doomed to failure – the not-so-bubbly Prosecco hangover sees to that. How are we possibly supposed to implement our early morning workout routine with nuclear nausea and an explosive headache mushroom-clouding our vision? Welcome, 2024, but would you mind shutting the door quietly on your way out and bringing me an overdue glass (gallon) of water? I fumble around on the ground for my phone, turning it on to the tune of Instant Regret: my notifications include a barrage of health-related articles no doubt designed to shame me personally. One particularly accusing headline asks me: “Did you drink too much last night?” How did they know?!

“Welcome, 2024, but would you mind shutting the door quietly on your way out and bringing me an overdue glass (gallon) of water?”

My family have always been stalwart believers in the New Year’s Day beach walk. Scotland has a tradition, aptly named the ‘Loony Dook’ – it’s a great chance for in-person You’ve Been Framed more than anything. I suppose the ritual is founded on the idea of a sort of annual baptism, submerging your old self and emerging with a clean (if hypothermic) slate for the next 365 days. It’s deeply personal, I imagine; the selves you shed and leave behind in the shallows. It’s also, certifiably, the cheapest and most eco-friendly way to freeze your eggs. Each year, we stand and watch a mass of bodies, diverse (as diverse as Scotland gets…) and daring, each seeking a fresh start – the sight is a touching testament to the human yearning for redemption. Or perhaps this is merely the projection of a frazzled finalist theology student.

I have a friend who subscribes to the belief that blue skies mean good days. If the same goes for years, then we are in luck. The shallows, in perpetual contrast to their tumultuous counterpart, are perfectly still. The world is reflected in them, a canopy of trees rippling lazily across this transparent canvas, solids made liquid, the projection of the present onto a drifting swathe of eternity, a reminder that everything is subject to change, no matter how stable or concrete it may seem. This fable is echoed further up the beach where a crag, a wizened face when viewed in profile, makes its lonely stand against the tide. But despite its courage and audacity, even it – like the hairline of many of my male friends – is receding, no match for the waves that amass in the distance. Their grey bulk is almost Jurassic in scale, hurling themselves at the old man’s brow. Brow-beating has never been so beautiful, so balletic. The singular swell splinters into a million droplets that seem to hang for a second, seasoning the air, in a primal process of reverse mysticism, the many springing from the one, before falling in slow motion to rejoin their brothers and sisters in the depth.

“At least there is consistency, and the assurance that some rhythms are beyond alteration”

Like all wannabe English students, my mind drifts to the final line of Virginia Woolf’s The Waves, when the perpetual pounding of waves that has formed the novel’s soundtrack carries on even as the characters pass away. “The waves broke on the shore,” the subtext being that they always will; no matter what happens in our little lives, time marches on, never pausing for those who grieve, those who are crippled and confined by fear, those who are simply hurting and hurting and hurting. Time and tide wait for no-one, marching on with a cold conviction that, were it not an inanimate body, would be a cruelty of the highest degree. But at least there is consistency, and the assurance that some rhythms are beyond alteration, that some tides transcend change, and that nature will not mourn us for long once we’re gone. You see, while this glimpse into the existential abyss would normally drag me into a pit of depression, today of all days, with the accompanying seasonal yearning for fresh starts and slates wiped clean, I am able to find comfort in erosion and erasure, be it partial or total. When the craggy old man, humanity’s figurehead, finally surrenders to the sea, I believe that his long-awaited fall will be a relief.

I am forever grateful that my family can’t read my thoughts, and that nihilism is not too infectious.

But this New Year’s Day I am here with my family, and although we are far from perfect, the day is closer to it. The sky is blue, we have a flask of coffee, and the year is shaping up to be a good one. Looking out to sea, I suspect that we are drawn to the beach on this particular day due to the moment’s liminality, as we stand together, balanced precariously on the cusp of the unknown. And we will continue to stand, allowing the onslaught of time to mould us as it sees fit, welcoming change with the resigned recognition that we are powerless against it.

I am abruptly snatched from my mind’s nihilistic wanderings by the need for canine intervention – my dog, a fluffy nymphomaniac with a zest for poodles, is disgracing us yet again. I guess some things don’t change after all.