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Wednesday, December 23, 2020

A Job for Christmas

Many years ago, when I was just out of college, I worked at a newspaper in the lowest possible position the paper had to offer. A paper is in business 365 days a year, so when Christmas came around at least one person in my position was required to work. For me, the idea of working on Christmas was unthinkable. It wasn't just that I hated that job any day of the week, but to end up working on Christmas day would have been unbearable. Luckily for me, my equally lowly coworker had no problem with working on Christmas. In fact, he was happy to do so, because, for him, it would have been especially lonely to have been stuck at home with nothing to do and nowhere to go, for you see, he had no family--or no family with whom he cared to interact at any rate. So that worked out just fine. Nonetheless, it was difficult for me to imagine what that would be like. What would it be like for Christmas to seem just the same as any other day of the year? At best. It seemed that there must certainly be something special about the day itself, something self generating, self sufficing. But I realize in these latter years that minus the family, minus the loved ones, minus the various date generated activities, there really is nothing special about Christmas day. It is just another day, although differentiated, perhaps, by seeming more lonely than the typical any other day sort of day, exacerbated, in fact, by a routine of the seasonal shows that seed the networks with love and family and gifts, and jingle bells and reindeer and sleighrides and so on. When you are alone, this is all taking place not only far away but in another time, another dimension. The bells stop, the singing stops, the lights go out, and there you are. Santa Claus is not coming tomorrow and there will be no holiday feast. Yes, I understand now how it was preferable for my friend to have something to do, anything to do on Christmas day. 

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