As we go to press, a congressional bulletin tells us that: “The U.S. Capitol Holiday Tree is scheduled to arrive at the West Front of the Capitol . . . on December 1.” This year’s Holiday Tree, we are further informed, is from the Boise national forest in Idaho. It will be decorated with more than 6,000 holiday ornaments and 10,000 colored holiday lights. Residents of Washington, D.C., will be able to admire the Holiday Tree as they bustle around doing their holiday shopping. Many of us will, of course, decorate our own homes with holiday lights and holiday wreaths. In our living rooms we shall put up holiday trees very much like the Capitol’s Holiday Tree, though of course much smaller. Under our holiday trees we shall pile holiday presents. To our friends and loved ones we shall send holiday cards. Perhaps we shall take our children to see a holiday show—a stage performance of Charles Dickens’s much-loved fable A Holiday Carol, perhaps. On Holiday Eve we may be serenaded by carol singers with “The Twelve Days of Holiday” or “We Wish You A Merry Holiday!” Then we shall read the little ones to sleep with Clement Clarke Moore’s classic poem “’Twas the night before Holiday.” On Holiday itself we shall open our holiday presents and eat our holiday dinner, then settle down to watch the holiday specials on TV. Remember, Holiday comes but once a year, so—Merry Holiday!
Tuesday, December 16, 2003
From National Review:
