During a quiet, first-day-of-the-year walk on the bike path today, I met but one other person. The path, though plowed, is still almost entirely covered with snow and ice, outlined with banks of snow more than a foot high. Despite sunny skies and higher-than-expected temperatures, it was almost deserted - a little peace of heaven for my dog and I. She chomped on chunks of ice and shoved her snow into the deepest drifts, while I reflected back on a year that was not half bad and the unwritten pages of the one just begun.

The only other brave soul was notable from some distance. He was tall, balding and handsome, wearing a long-sleeved shirt, tennis shoes, high socks and shorts.

As we drew closer to one another, he looked up, nearly lost his footing on a patch of ice and smiled sheepishly. I could not help but comment on his attire.

"You're starting the year on an optimistic note, wearing shorts to hike, aren't you?"

He was almost past me, but turned his head and gave me a surprised, delighted grin.

"That's exactly what it is!" he said. "A euphemism for the new year."

Our paths had crossed for a second, and we separated again, each in our own direction. But I liked him immediately and well in that moment.

I wished I had done something so ridiculously symbolic, and was weirdly proud of myself for having picked up on his.

I looked around for other people who might be engaging in activities, rituals, displaying their hope for the new year.

A young black man waited to cross Lincoln Avenue, a McDonald's bag in his hand. This seemed unpromising indeed. Maybe it indicated his intent to live 2007 at a fast pace, consuming it with a voracious appetite. But judging by the sunglasses and the slump of his shoulders, it seems likely he was just hungover.

At the dumpster at my apartment complex, I met a woman taking out her garbage.

"This is the way to start a new year," she said, flinging the bags up and over the dumpster's high edge.

Nice, but not nearly as good as the man in shorts. Tossing the garbage of the old year is one thing; realizing new trash is about to accumulate another, somewhat depressing reality.

I started my first day of the new year without a hangover, in the company of good friends, my hands wrapped around a warm mug of good coffee and pleasant conversation flowing among us. Not a bad way to begin. I ended this first day with a date, in the pleasant company of someone new, hand around a glass of Pinot Grigio and pleasant conversation flowing between us. Not a bad way to end this first day either.

Still, not as good as the man in shorts.

I wonder a little about this guy, and ponder the idea that 2006 was a difficult year for him. If he divorced or lost a job. But his smile was too broad, I think, for that. Instead, I suspect - or just prefer to believe - this to be an annual rite of passage for him. That he's simply a good-humored guy who believes actions speak louder than words, and who marches into each new year with the same slightly goofy, brilliant optimism.

I wish for myself, and for all of you, that same sense of delicious expectation as this new year unfurls.

And I wish for the man on the bike path not only that his symbolic walk sets him down a positive path, but frankly, that he soon takes a beach vacation. Cute as he was, those legs were paler and more blinding than the virgin snow.