View from the North 40: The event boundary you didn't know you needed

The annual build-up of anticipation for New Year’s Day is, I think, the clearest proof of mankind’s eternal, stalwart and irrational optimistic nature.

How many times have we said it or heard it: “Ugh, 2020 has been the worst. I can’t wait until it’s over.”

As if, at the stroke of midnight heralding in Jan. 1, 2021, we will pass through a portal into a modern realm that’s as happy as a nuclear family in a 1950s sitcom, or maybe we’ll skip-jump into a brighter timeline in the infinite universe. As if.

That’s a hard no with a full stop at the end.

I don’t mean to be a Debbie Downer here. OK? I’m...