Not Quite a Miracle on 34th Street

If you got up before the chickens (or turkey leftovers) and before my brother this morning to avail yourself of Black Friday holiday savings, this may be past your bedtime, though it starts late this afternoon and goes into the early evening.

In my house, there's two things we try to do during the Thanksgiving Day holiday, with varying degrees of success. One is to watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade (this year the question wasn't so much 'who knew Jimmy Fallon sings?' as 'who cares?' but we're a sentimental lot) and on the day following Thanksgiving (today), make it to Angelo Sanquedolce Square on Broadway in Norwich for the lighting of City Hall.

I don't imagine we are alone even in the state of Connecticut much less across these fifty states, united (for the most part), in having an event like this. If you don't have one near your house, you can come to ours as it's the more the merrier. And if there is one where you live, I'm telling you what you already know, as they're very alike in all the important ways.

They have lots of people we see every other day of the year, but who are happier and smilier than they were even as recently as this morning. There's a ton or more of people who energetically and enthusiastically sing Christmas songs with varying degrees of success (defined by staying on key and in pitch) but that's NOT why they sing or why we listen, and it's generally a time when we celebrate ourselves for having come together for another holiday season.

This year around here, much like where you live, it's been a harder slog. Times have been tougher than in recent memory for a lot of us and we may have a ways to go before we can look a little on the sunny side, but this is the season of hope so we do. And it's okay to smile in anticipation, as my wife does, that a new annual Christmas ornament will be offered at a booth set up just for this afternoon at City Hall as part of the festivities. We take it home and every year Sigrid adds it to our tree, and it becomes part of our Christmas tradition.

I think, but am not sure, we have every ornament that's ever been made. Ido know we have a memory to go with each, to include the year the lighting was postponed because of the ferocity of the weather that landed on us, without warning, and then disappeared almost as quickly as it arrived. Lots of us hiked down Broadway anyway, just to make sure it didn't happen without us, and it didn't. The following week we all came together and oohed and ahhed as Santa waved to all of us from a third story window and we counted down the last ten seconds before the lights came on. For a moment we were all six again. I wouldn't miss it for all the seven year olds in the world and hope to see you there this afternoon. Merry Christmas!
-bill kenny