On New Year’s Eve, we’re expecting 22 people for dinner. A novelist, a choreographer, a real-estate developer, a political pollster with a deep knowledge of evolutionary biology. Plus girlfriends, partners, and my sister, who’s flying in from D.C. with her family. Among others.
My wife will prepare a vat of beef stew with a very nice 2023 cabernet sauvignon, plus a gluten-free lasagna (this is Los Angeles, folx!), and a few guests will bring beet salad and asparagus salad and a fennel-and-Gruyère salad, and my mother will provide a few desserts—probably something involving a mousse or meringue. My 11-year-old will play a Handel Bourrée on her violin, and her cousins may perform a piano sonata on our upright.
At some point after the dishes have been cleared and before we refill everyone’s champagne flutes in anticipation of 2026, we’ll whip out a notepad and ballpoint pens, and ask everyone to write down their five predictions for the next year—things like “GOP gets trounced in November” or “Hamnet wins Best Picture” or “I won’t be dating the person I’m sitting next to right now by this time next year” (which has happened more than once).
This is our tenth New Year’s Eve repast.
