It’s Christmas & a Merry one to you

I like Christmas because it’s the one day of the year where pretty much everyone says nice things, does nice things and thinks nice things. This contrasts with what I believe are the majority of folks who claim to act this way – a way that’s in accordance with their professed religious beliefs – but really don’t, on the other 364 days of the year. Below is a quote from John Steinbeck. Please excuse the gendered language, but it was written back in 1938 and taken from his journal and used in the introduction in one of the later releases of “Of Mice and Men”. If you can see your way past the language of the times I think his words are as relevant today as they were eighty years ago, and I think our country and our world wound benefit if we followed them every day of the year, not just one of them. They might even help more than silent pleas to a heavenly body/bodies, who knows?

“In every bit of honest writing in the world, there is a base theme. Try to understand men, if you understand each other you will be kind to each other. Knowing a man well never leads to hate and nearly always leads to love. There are shorter means, many of them. There is writing promoting social change, writing punishing injustice, writing in celebration of heroism, but always that base theme. Try to understand each other.” – John Steinbeck

Be kind to someone today and for the next 364 days. Merry Christmas to you.