Gratitude Is the Attitude

If you've been a little slow to get your holiday season started, there's no time like the present (that's both a hint and a play on words, btw) to pick up the pace, my friend, because the festive occasions are coming thick and fast and nearly non-stop between now and the beginning of the next year. 

Let's face it, the autumn days continue to grow shorter giving way to darker skies with hints of snow in every brisk(er) breeze; the newspapers get a little plumper as merchants boost their advertising hoping to catch a shopper's eye while halls and other stationary objects find themselves bedecked in holly and garland.

As you probably read in Bob Farwell's Bulletin column, the tenth annual O'tis a Festival is this Saturday from ten until three (with Santa projected to arrive at eleven). Naysayers to the contrary, there's plenty of free parking and again this year helpers to guide you to the primo parking spots. 

And there promises to be music, merriment, and entertainment for the whole family as well as two floors of handmade arts and crafts from dozens of regional vendors with ideas and offerings to help jump-start your annual gift-gathering and giving. If you haven't attended in previous years, you've picked a good time to come and enjoy.  

One of the bonuses, I think, to the O'tis a Festival is all the added hustle and bustle it brings to downtown, not to mention the extra feet in the street (and on the sidewalks) to check out not just the fest but what downtown businesses have been added and improved since last year and there are a lot, so come early with the intention to stay late.

And while the O'Tis a Festival is a terrific time (and reason) to get started on just-right gifts for loved ones and others on your list there are opportunities to give and share the spirit of the season especially with those in need right here in our backyard.

After you've visited the O'tis a Festival, please stop by Norwich Family Dental Associates on Lafayette Street because Saturday is the last day of their Third Annual Fill Ted's Truck to benefit the St. Vincent De Paul Place Thanksgiving dinner. You can find a very long list of suggested perishable and non-perishable donations on their Facebook page. And everything helps. 

With Thanksgiving a week from tomorrow, your Connecticut Food Bank will also put to good use any donation of food or cash that you’d like to offer. And speaking of cash, the Bank of America has partnered again this year with Feeding America to fight hunger. For every $1 you give, Bank of America will give $2 more. So, if you give $25, they’ll make it $75. If you give $50, they’ll make it $150 and so on.

We can help make this a happier holiday season for both friends and friends we’ve yet to meet. Open your heart and know whatever you share is both needed and appreciated.

-bill kenny