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Highlands Today

And It Came To Pass

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By Norm Cukras | Highlands Today

Published: October 20, 2007

Back in the days when man first ventured out of the caves and celebrated the occasion by giving thanks to the Great Spirit the people vowed that the preparation time for their holidays would be limited to some reasonable amount of time. Like perhaps the cycle of one moon, which many eons later was called a month and many eons after that they were given a name: As in October which is what the moon cycle before the one when thanks was given to the Great Spirit and out of which our country's first displaced inhabitants evolved.

And many eons after that first giving of thanks the Great Spirit returned the recognition of his people by rewarding them with a special gift of his own. A man-child. The appearance of this gift held such significance for the people that they name a day after it. They called it Christmas.

Now when the two things are considered – limiting preparations to no more than on a lunar cycle and the acceptance of the gift of the Great Spirit – it would appear that the preparations for Christmas should occur at the earliest around the time that the feast of thanksgiving is celebrated. And for many years this is how it came to pass.

Christmas decorations and gift suggestions began to appear near the end of November. And then the devil came among the people. And he whispered in the ear of the sellers, "The sooner you put your products before the eyes of the public the more money you are likely to earn." And to the buyers he said, "You are very busy and you need more time to purchase things so be happy that you can shop early."

And now it seems the tradition has fallen by the wayside.

Did I Miss Thanksgiving?

Last week we went over to the Lakeshore Mall, it was beginning to look a lot like Christmas, as the classic Christmas song tells us. Nestled among the Halloween decorations were Christmas items – already. And maybe it is not too ironic that some of them were on sale – already. I resisted the urge to browse through the stuff, let alone buy anything. I have more important things to do with my time around this time of the year: like preparing a relaxing place for myself in a sincere pumpkin patch where I can wait comfortably for the Great Pumpkin on Halloween. Actually I'm going to wait two evenings in the patch this year because I'm not sure if he comes during the night of Halloween or on the eve of Halloween, which may be why I've never met him before. I really should tell Linus about my new theory.

Not Like Gifts From The Magi

Out of the advertising world has come a bunch of sayings that have evolved into clichés: two notable ones are, "Run it up the flagpole and see if anybody salutes it," and: "Promise her anything but give her Arpege." Now that it's the political popularity contest time to determine who will be our next president the concept of these clichés is being overworked. Ideas are popping up like Orville Redenbacher's popular snack food. Like The Hillary's all but now defunct idea to give every baby born in the United States a $5,000 college fund bond. It's a great concept but two small items seemed to have been overlooked: how much it was going cost and how were we going to stem the tide of expectant mothers from around the world flooding into the country to get their child a bonus?

Promise them anything - that will get a vote.

By the way, according to my calculations it would cost in the neighborhood of $21 billion a year to fund this program.

Overheard

Overheard at the checkout counter: I asked my wife if there was anything I could do to make her happy this holiday season. She said, leave.

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