Tag Archives: holidays

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THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS

I’m surprised Trump and his cult want all of the nation to celebrate the 250th anniversary of independence.

The key word in the above sentence is celebrate.

It’s hard to think of people more miserable than Donald Trump, the kakistocracy that comprises the U.S. government and his mean-spirited MAGA supporters. If you told me they all suffer from chronic constipation, I would believe it.

Two prime examples of recent Trumpgrump:

— Apparently, Trump thinks you don’t work enough. The guy who put a cage match on the White House lawn for his birthday said that there are too many non-working holidays and they’re bad for the nation’s economy. 

He said this, of course, on Juneteenth, a recently created holiday to mark the anniversary of when slaves in Galveston, Texas, finally found out they weren’t slaves anymore. Yeah, why would Trump want to celebrate that?

But he couldn’t mention Juneteenth specifically because that would mean he’s a racist – although, note to Donald, that’s not particularly well-hidden. Instead, he said that there are too many holidays in general, and we need to get rid of some of them to make our economy great again.

Ha! No workers in the developed world take as little time off as Americans. There are countries that shut down for entire months in the summer. There are countries that give parents six months or a year of time off for a newborn or adoption.

Trump thinks 10 paid holidays a year is too much. He’s on board with not taking all your vacation time at work. You have to make him and his friends more money. That’s your purpose in life.

— One of the biggest reasons that young people don’t want to start a family is that they can’t afford a home for kids to have the same quality of life they did.

In a lightning bolt of bipartisanship, Congress passed a measure aimed at making homes more affordable. Among its provisions, limits on investment firms purchasing residential housing, one of the things driving the tight market.

It’s a win for Republicans in a time when wins are hard to get. You would think Trump would just take the gift of a chance to look like a leader that the Democrats helped give him.

Nah.

Trump canceled a ceremony to sign the bill because he wants to push his divisive bill on voter ID that would, among other things, disenfranchise married women.

So a happy moment of accomplishment turns into another head-butting stupor.

The funny thing is that the only way Trump can stop this bill from going into effect is vetoing it and forcing the bill’s advocates to come up with a two-thirds majority to override. And somebody would be embarrassed by that – either Trump, because for once Republicans would stand up to him, or the Republicans, because they would capitulate to Trump once again, helping Democratic campaign writers again.

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Joy is not lost.

In New York, a million people turned out to celebrate the New York Knicks’ NBA championship. In Chicago, the opening of the Obama Presidential Center was marked with amazing musical performances and a wonderful tribute to the former president from the former First Lady.

Throughout the country, visitors from around the world attending the World Cup are discovering that most Americans are not as miserable as Donald Trump. The joyous celebrations of the Scots in Boston, the Norwegians here in New York, among others, are giving the lie to the notion that American cities – especially those in blue states -are hellholes.

It’s also Pride Month. And despite no official recognition from their president and the sour pusses of people like the San Francisco Giant pitchers who are trying to use the Bible to “reclaim the rainbow,” the celebration of love for whoever you want to love continues full bore.

You know, it’s fun to be happy. It makes you feel better. It makes you like the people around you more.

Maybe that’s why Jefferson threw in that line about “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” when he wrote the Declaration of Independence 250 years ago. It’s in our national DNA to seek good times. To try to smile.

Trump and his ilk should try it sometime. Instead of complaining about a nation of immigrants and differing ways of looking at the world. Instead of aspiring to some ridiculous notion of warriorism.

You know, instead of being jerks.

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HOLIDAY SONG COUNTDOWN: GOOD KING WENCESLAS – 26 DAYS UNTIL CHRISTMAS

You’ve probably been listening to this song your entire life and not understood a) why it’s a Christmas song and b) who the heck King Wenceslas was and what kingdom did he rule.

Let’s start with second things first.

First of all, Wenceslaus I wasn’t a king. He was a duke of Bohemia (now Czechia), the equivalent of a prince. He lived in the 900s – he might be the best known person of the 10th century by default.

Most of what we know about him is legend – there aren’t a whole lot of documents remaining from 1,100 years ago. But apparently, as the song indicates, he went around providing comfort for the impoverished in his realm.

Wenceslaus was supposedly murdered by his younger brother, whose name – believe it or not – was Boleslaus the Cruel. They didn’t fool around with names back then.

Later in the 9th century, the Holy Roman Emperor posthumously crowned Wenceslaus, who also was made a saint by the Catholic Church.

As for the song, the feast of Stephen is the second of the 12 days of Christmas, a day honoring  one of the first Christian martyrs, 

The Wenceslaus legend hung around throughout the centuries. In the 1850s, a British hymn writer put lyrics to a 13th century melody, dropped the u from his name, and, voila, “Good King Wenceslas.”

It’s not one of my favorite holiday songs and I can’t name a definitive version. So here is a version I found on YouTube by the Irish Rovers. 

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43 – THE UNIFORM MONDAY HOLIDAY ACT OF 1968

Do you know what date Presidents Day fell on in 1954?

That’s a trick question. It didn’t.

In 1954, there was no Presidents Day. There was a holiday on Friday, February 12 to commemorate Abraham Lincoln’s birthday and a holiday on Monday, February 22 to commemorate George Washington’s.

No matter what day of the week those dates fell in a year, that was the holiday. If February 12 was a Wednesday, that was the day off.

What made that problematic is the idea that it’s hard to go away to celebrate a holiday in the middle of the week. Especially for the mammoth federal workforce.

Now, three-day weekends, that’s cool. If holidays always fall on Monday, you can plan a weekend around leaving Friday night and coming back Monday afternoon. That’s three nights of frolic, or whatever.

So, in 1968, Congress passed and President Lyndon Johnson signed a measure moving certain federal holidays to Monday. In the case of the two presidents’ birthdays in February, they were combined into one holiday on the third Monday of the month. It was called…

Washington’s Birthday.

That’s right. Today’s official holiday is not, according to the federal government, Presidents Day, It’s just named for Washington.

Some states and a lot of people thought that gave short shrift to the man generally regarded as the nation’s greatest president, Lincoln. Hence, the name “Presidents Day,” which is generally how the wall calendar you got for the holidays refers to it.

Strangely, Presidents Day never falls on either Lincoln’s or Washington’s actual birthday.

The act also initially affected three other holidays:

— Memorial Day. It was traditionally May 31 every year. But the 1968 law switched that to the final Monday of May – which could be the 31st, but could also be as early as May 25. (This year, it’s May 28.)

— Columbus Day, which had only been a state holiday, got promoted to federal status. It would always be the second Monday in October – which could be the traditional date of the 12th, when Columbus landed in this hemisphere, but can range from the 8th to the 14th. 

(It also could lose its name if the movement to change the day’s name to Indigenous People’s Day, instead of naming it for a man who oppressed them, gains steam.)

— Veterans Day, traditionally November 11, was moved to the fourth Monday in October, between the 22nd and 28th. 

But that didn’t last long – after only a few years, the holiday reverted to November 11 to sync with the celebration of veterans in other nations who fought together in World War I.

When the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday went into effect in 1986, it was celebrated on the third Monday in January. That meant between January 15 – Dr. King’s actual birthday – and the 21st.

Labor Day was always the first Monday in September and remained so. The proponents of the legislation dared not legislate Independence Day, Thanksgiving (the fourth Thursday of November), Christmas and New Year’s. 

Have a nice holiday!

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