The Boerne Star (Boerne, Tex.), Vol. 103, No. 100, Ed. 1 Tuesday, December 15, 2009 Page: 5 of 24
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Tuesday, December 15, 2009
The BOERNE Star
Page 5A
V I E W P
O I N T S
Get your hometown news online at
www.boernestar.com
Nagging, teetering, and barely avoiding divorce
As I wandered through the
Internet the other day, I found
a column entitled ’’Hanging
Christmas Lights Outdoors
Without Getting Divorced.”
It’s not a snappy title, granted,
but its subject caught my eye
because of the ritual rift that the
Breadwinner and I endure every
year, sometime in the weeks
after Thanksgiving.
This year my husband finally
said to me, “Look. It’s your job
to nag me about hanging the
lights. It’s my job to complain
about getting them put up.”
So I knew better than to press
him about hanging lights on
the Old Fellers’ house, too.
Not thinking it wise to tell the
septuagenarians just to do it
themselves (they would), and
with no college kids around, I
decided there’s no one better
than myself.
Surely I could do this with-
out resentment or broken bones,
especially given how important
outdoor lights are to the world
in general - lights in the dark-
ness, beacons of hope, brilliance
in the gloom, etc.
The original electric Christmas
light display, it seems, was the
1912 New York City Christmas
tree, a spectacle put together
with a surprisingly pious pur-
pose. “(T)he celebration would
OFF THE MAIN
A Elena Tucker
Have you been
encourage greater friendship
ties between strangers from all
different backgrounds who oth-
erwise would not have spoken
to one another,” a Yale history
journal documents.
An astounding 80,000 people
showed up one night to see to
the outdoor lights - people who
clearly didn’t know the emo-
tional and physical angst that
light-hanging would bring over
the next century.
Another decade passed before
outdoor Christmas lights, “hot,
impractical, and expensive,”
became available to the general
public” - lights that promised
the sun’s return while holding
darkness’ evil spirits at bay.
Electric Christmas lights were
still thought of as having the
ability to “comfort people in
desperate situations.”
In fact, outdoor light dis-
plays are actually thought to be
a reflection of socioeconomic
times. For example, during the
1930, during the Great Depres-
sion, all-blue light displays
were common, a reflection of
“the somber mood of a nation
in trouble.”
Our home has all-blue lights,
too, although I’m not sure they
reflect a “somber mood.” I just
got them by accident. I thought
all warm and tingly and happy. this way because I know how
They’re hung, though, that’s lost extension cords, opinion-
what’s important. Somehow it offering, ladder teetering,
makes Sparky and me quite strand-untangling combined
happy, although I can’t speak with deliberations over end-
for how they affect humanity to-end or plug-into-plug only
at large. to discover how the electrical
The Old Fellers go for multi- outlet is, in fact, not where we
colored strands that my mother remembered it to be - well, bet-
calls “old-fashioned,” a rather ter I work alone lest we never
odd choice of words for a exchange cordial words again,
woman who grew up in a farm- I’m not sure that all our out-
house without electricity. door lights have brought about
Anyway, last year it was the peace on earth, or “social inter-
Old Fellers who nearly got a action between people who
divorce, and my mom hasn’t yet otherwise would not have spo-
gotten over her bitterness. She ken to one another.”
bought all-new lights this year In fact, anybody who knows
to replace last year’s remnants anything about outdoor lights
- strands of broken, partially knows they’re more like to have
burnt-out lights that finally the opposite effect.
caused my dad to retreat, frus- Yet, once again, we’ve all
trated, from his advice-giving managed to get our lights hung
Buy 3 months get 3
. hai Month FREE
they were white.
The Breadwinner finally got
out last week, on the coldest
morning of the year, to hang our
LED icicles - stark blue strings
of lights that make me shiver to
look at them, rather than feeling
role at the base of the ladder.
It hurt my mother to have
to throw those “perfectly good
old-fashioned” lights away and
buy new ones. But she under-
estimated this year and came
up short. So, happily, my dad
still has something to com-
plain about, should he feel so
inclined.
As for me, decorating the Old
Fellers’ house was a work of
pure love, hope, and dedica-
tion, just like the Yale journal
pointed out - my effort was that
of providing hope in the “vast
darkness” that is our neighbor-
hood, (and, sometimes, in the
holiday mood of our family
circle).
I carefully chose an afternoon
when I’d be alone. I planned
and even plugged in, once we
found the extension cord.
Next year, the Old Fellers will
look for a few more lights. And
while they’re at it, they’d bet-
ter find someone younger and
braver than me to hang them.
Either that, or we can always
nag the Breadwinner into doing
it.
BOERNE ETT
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... and God came down
This is my Christmas column.
It is not for everybody. Actually
it is, but not everybody will read
STICKS & STONES
it or, having read it, will say,
“Bah! Humbug!”
But I must say at the outset that
I believe in Christmas. I believe
it is in celebration of the birth of
Jesus Christ, the Messiah of the "
ancient Jews, and the Savior of
all the world if the world so desires.
I believe he was who He said He was and that he
| died and rose again from death. It was proof of his
■ legitimacy as the Son of God.
There was a time within my lifetime when most
Americans and a large part of other nations either
believed this or acted as if they did. Of those who
did not believe, most recognized that there were
absolutes of right and wrong.
They took it as either something implanted in
them by nature or that right just simply worked
better.
It is not that everybody was so much better in
those days, but rather that they believed in being
better and wanted, in fact, to do better.
I saw the world at that time as divided up in
separate groups. There were Christians, Jews,
Mohammedans, Buddhists, a few other lesser-
known sects, and a large pool of people who gave
their allegiance to no god and were natural sub-
jects for evangelical endeavor.
Those who professed to worship God were as
diverse as the pantheon of old Greek or Roman
gods, and while many of them were right on in
many of their beliefs, they did not have a handle
on His true nature.
After all, the evidence for God is all about us,
and yet there were some who were basically
Ed Davis
propitiating devils rather than
worshiping God.
This country was originally
populated by people seeking reli-
gious freedom, and the country
was ultimately founded on Chris-
tian principles. There are many
who want to make something of
the fact that the Declaration of
Independence and the Constitu-
tion were signed by some who were not Christian,
but that is beside the point. The documents speak
for themselves.
So having said that this was not a nation of Chris-
tians, I have to say also that there was not a lot of
opposition to Christianity, and that is the thing that
has changed the most.
I am often aghast at the number of intelligent
people in high places who are either openly antag-
onistic or support those who are. We have always
had atheists, for instance, but only recently have
they organized and blatantly attacked Christianity.
Christianity is no threat to them. We are not try-
ing to force it upon them as, for instance, does
Islam.
My guess is that most of this is coming from
guilt. I believe that they have become devoted to
an unchristian lifestyle and that the conscience
embedded in them from the start is causing them
to express angry opposition lest they have to stop
and acknowledge a different set of values.
And finally, I want to say I believe God is Love.
Not a loving God, not some anthropomorphic
figure brooding over His creation like some super
human being, but exactly what the Bible says of
Him.
He is a spirit. He is love. The proof of this is in
the pudding. It is the only thing that works..
An Inconvenient Climategate
"The world cannot trust scien-
tists who abuse their power.”
-L. Gordon Crovitz,
Wall Street Journal
BREATH OF FRESH AIR
as Stage 1
age —
saRMaL
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Cartwright, Brian & Velvin, Candace E. The Boerne Star (Boerne, Tex.), Vol. 103, No. 100, Ed. 1 Tuesday, December 15, 2009, newspaper, December 15, 2009; Boerne, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1667465/m1/5/: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Patrick Heath Public Library.