New Year?s Eve 2023 In Bel Air: Duck Drop, Fireworks, Dance

HARFORD COUNTY, MD ? Count down to 2024 at the Havre de Grace Annual Duck Drop at Concord Point Park. Ring in the New Year with the Duck Drop, then watch the fireworks sparkle along the Havre de Grace waterfront afterward.

Live music and a dance will be sponsored by the Sons of the American Legion Squadron 47 in Havre de Grace on New Year's Eve with Jill Black and the Panic Attack. Doors open at 8 p.m. with a meal from 8:30 p.m. until 10 p.m. and a cash bar available all night. A champagne toast at midnight included.

There also will be a New Year's Eve party for families hosted by We Rock the Spectrum with gym play that includes sensory activities and a countdown to the New Year at noon with a balloon drop.

In the United States, one of the most popular New Year?s Eve traditions is the dropping of the giant ball in New York City?s Times Square. Other U.S. cities have adopted iterations of the ball drop ? the Chick Drop in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania and the giant Potato Drop in Boise, Idaho, for example.

The end of one year and beginning of another is often celebrated with the singing of ?Auld Lang Syne,? a Scottish folk song whose title roughly translates to ?days gone by,? according to Encyclopedia Britannica and History.com.

The history of New Year?s resolutions dates back 8,000 years to ancient Babylonians, who would make promises to return borrowed objects and pay outstanding debts at the beginning of the new year, in mid-March when they planted their crops.

According to legend, if they kept their word, pagan gods would grant them favor in the coming year. If they broke the promise, they would fall out of God?s favor, according to a history of New Year?s resolutions compiled by North Hampton Community College New Center in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.

Many secular New Year?s resolutions focus on imagining new, improved versions of ourselves.

The failure rate of New Year?s resolutions is about 80 percent, according to U.S. News & World Report. There are myriad reasons, but a big one is they?re made out of remorse ? for gaining weight, for example ? and aren?t accompanied by a shift in attitude and a plan to meet the stress and discomfort of changing a habit or condition.