I have every intention of getting some work done today....I promise! BUT FIRST! A little holiday-themed procrastination!
I talked a lot in my anthropology class about holidays. We had a whole class about Halloween traditions and horror movies. We spent another class making a "web of significance" (Oh, Geertz!) diagram on the board about Thanksgiving, Black Friday, and Christmas. Holidays make for great class discussion because everyone always has something to say. However differently we all may feel about "the holiday season," it is something (in our culture) that unites us.
Whether you feel that holidays are a socially-constructed equilibrium maintenance mechanism (Oh, Harris!), a cultural celebration of history, tradition, and family, an excuse to gluttonously indulge in food and shopping, a semi-annual celebration of religious values....or just a day off of work, I really hope you enjoy your holidays! Make of them what you will! Here's what a few other folks think about them:
A perpetual holiday is a good working definition of hell. - George Bernard Shaw
Come, woo me, woo me, for now I am in a holiday humor, and like enough to consent.
- William Shakespeare
Christmas is a time when you get homesick -- even when you're home. - Carol Nelson
There's nothing sadder in this world than to awake Christmas morning and not be a child. - Erma Bombeck
Isn't it funny that at Christmas something in you gets so lonely for - I don't know what exactly, but it's something that you don't mind so much not having at other times. ~Kate L. Bosher
There are some people who want to throw their arms round you just because it's Christmas, there are other people who want to strangle you just because its Christmas
- Robert Lynd
And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow, stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so? It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags. And he puzzled and puzzled 'till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before. What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store. What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more. - Dr. Seuss
Probably the reason we all go so haywire at Christmas time with the endless unrestrained and often silly buying of gifts is that we don't quite know how to put our love into words - Harlan Miller
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