Time, Space, and the New Year

So here we are at a new year. Nothing very special about it, considering that all a new year really means is that the calender just starts over again. But let us investigate this phenomenon known as "the new year":
It is now 2012.

That is two thousand and twelve years since the supposed birth of singular man. This is based on the Gregorian calendar that was created in 1582 (according to same said calendar) by Pope Gregory XIII. This calendar differs from the previously used Julian system that was actually exactly eleven minutes longer. So basically up until the known year of 1582 there is anywhere from ten to fourteen days difference in dates that mark the same event. Up until 1752 January first was not recognized as the start of the new year for Britain and the British Empire. Prior to that, the new year was marked by December 25th, also known as...Christmas. And, without confusing you even farther, this does not even remotely account for the leap years, which is in accordance with the Earths elliptical movement around the sun.

According to the Holocene Calendar, also known as the Human Era Calendar, we add 10,000 (ten THOUSAND) years to the current date, marking the beginning of the Holocene era and the neolithic revolution as "1" and making today's date January 1st 12012 HE. This is marked not by the birth of a singular man but by the evolutionarily relevant footprint of mankind as a whole.

According to the Islamic lunar calendar the year is 1433 and it is not currently the first day of the first month of a new calendar cycle.

So what day is it? Where are we in the span of time as a tangible concept? Current belief is that the Earth is 4.54 billion years old, based on radiometric dating of lunar samples. Depending on different theories of universe creation (flat universe? expanding universe? big bang?) the universe is currently thought to be 13.7 billion years old.

Time as we see it, with names and dates, are a human creation. The stars do not adhere to these ideas, the universe is ever expanding (if you believe as such) and time itself is actually being created in the depths of the universe as we speak. Somewhere in the farthest reaches of space it truly is the first day of existence. It is the beginning.

People tend to think that January first is the start of a new year, a new time. We have gone around the sun for 365+- days and have ended up right back where we began. But we have not. We are never where we were milliseconds ago. As I type, we are careening through space. We can choose to think of January 1st, 2012 as the start of a new time personally or...or...

We can choose to make everyday a new beginning. Everyday, no matter where we are, can be a new start.

And yet, after all of this, today is my new start.