Just Blowing Smoke...: Merry Christmas

Quotes of the Week

... because the sharpest curve that many of us will ever have to negotiate is that of a well-turned phrase

“Reader, suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.”
― Mark Twain

“Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies.”
― Groucho Marx

“I predict future happiness for Americans, if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.”
― Thomas Jefferson

“The first duty of a man is to think for himself”
― Jose Marti

“Government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond its limits is in deciding to protect us from ourselves.”
― Ronald Reagan

“Our great democracies still tend to think that a stupid man is more likely to be honest than a clever man, and our politicians take advantage of this prejudice by pretending to be even more stupid than nature made them.”
― Bertrand Russell

Thursday, December 24, 2009

Merry Christmas

I have taken the opportunity to poke fun at the holiday season a number of times in recent weeks, both here in the blog and the in my columns for the Toledo Free Press. I don't want to let that sense of humor with which I think that it is essential that reality needs to be viewed however (even when you have one as warped as mine), disparage in any way the feelings of the season.

While I do not intend to get into the religious aspects of either Christmas or Hanukkah here, I believe them both worthy of the special esteem with which they are held. And as I honor the beliefs of each of my acquaintances, friends, and family; so too will I honor and respect these holiday traditions as something of great value. As to the secular aspect of Christmas however, let me say this ...

Christmas is a special time of year, bringing family and friends together because of (and sometime regardless of) those beliefs. It exists separately from those beliefs, and lives and breathes in the kind nature and charitable spirit that is the best of each of us. It is in the warm greetings that we share with strangers, the generosity we show those less fortunate, and in the opportunity to come together, often when those opportunities become more rare.

Most especially, it is a holiday seen in the joy on the faces of little children. While it's true that some of this naturally has to do with the receiving of presents, just as much as to do with the excitement inherent in the experience of the day. Who among us has not smiled watching a child ignore the large present in favor of the still larger box that it came in? Who has not laughed at the sheer delight of a pet frolicking while awash in wrapping paper? Who of us has not welled with emotion watching the parent or grandparent open the handmade gift of a child. Who of us has not felt that special joy that only comes when seeing in the face of a loved one, the result of a specially chosen or gift?

So on this Christmas Eve, let me offer this humble gift to you. May you have a a Happy Hanukkah, a very Merry Christmas indeed, and the happiest and most prosperous of New Years.