Of Holidays and Celebrations by Konnie Enos

Where has the time gone?

It’s already November.

The time of the year when businesses start advertising all their Black Friday deals and gift ideas. The time of year when people plan gluttonous meals and go frantic about buying stuff. All to celebrate the season.

It’s the season for the idea that we must spend tons, buying piles and piles of what amounts to extravagances. All those things we would like to have but would never actually buy because we can do without them, they’re too costly, they’re not necessary. But somehow buying those things as gifts for others once a year is acceptable. The season when the planning and execution of one very large meal is vital to the well-being of everyone, somehow.

We put so much emphasis on the gifts and the food that we’ve lost the real meaning of this season of celebrations.

We do celebrate Thanksgiving with food, and Christmas with gifts, but we’ve lost the meaning of why we do these celebrations.

Why food?

Thanksgiving began as a celebration of a bountiful harvest and food, AND friends. But it’s not about the food, or the friends, or even family. It’s about giving thanks. This is the perfect season to count our blessings and see what God has done. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we all spent this month daily adding to our list of the blessings we’ve received. That’s the way to celebrate giving thanks.

Christmas is a celebration of gifts, family and friends, but more than that, it’s the celebration of CHRIST. Far too often people take Christ out of Christmas (literally and figuratively). Wouldn’t we all feel better about the season if we put him back into it?

Instead of focusing so hard on the gifts we give, or might get, how about focusing on giving Christ some gifts. We’re celebrating his birth after all.

What can we give him?

Our service. Serve others. Find ways to help and uplift those around you. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints sponsors Giving Machines during the season, providing us with opportunities to help people at home, and worldwide. Just Serve (https://www.justserve.org/) has opportunities to serve in your own community. Find one, or more, that you’d like to help and support and donate your time, or money. Ask in your own community, your church, or find ways to uplift others as you go about your day. A smile can go a long way and doesn’t cost a thing.

And maybe, just maybe, you can sit down and reflect on the life of Christ. Even if you don’t believe in his divine mission, reflect on the life he lived. A man of honor, kindness, acceptance, forgiveness, and boundless love. A man who quietly served, and taught, how to be a better person.

Then after you’ve done those things, maybe the effort you put into that big meal, or all those gifts will take on a different significance. Maybe you’ll stop fussing about the turkey cooked to perfection or the exact right amount and variety of side dishes and instead focus on the friends and family you get to spend time with. Maybe instead of focusing on buying that huge pile of gifts you’ll focus on the people you want to bless, serve, help, love be it with a small gesture, or a large one. But one that will greatly touch those you give them to.

Sorry, this is not only shorter than usual, but late. However, I’m leaving this here to give each of you time to think about how you’ll celebrate the season.

Happy Holidays, one and all.

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.

Of Celebrations and Milestones by Konnie Enos

As humans, we make a habit of celebrating events and milestones in our lives, from a baby’s birth, through their first tooth and on through graduations, marriage, etc. As the years pile on, we celebrate those. Some more than others.

I’ve personally celebrated numerous events and milestones in my lifetime. Milestones like graduating high school or getting my associate’s degree in both arts and science. Events like birthdays, marriages, baptisms, and anniversaries. I even remember the momentous occasion of celebrating our nation’s 200^th birthday. Thanks to when our birthday is, we also celebrated our 14^th birthday that weekend.

I’ve celebrated my silver wedding anniversary with all my children around me. (This was a few years ago before any of them were married, or had boy/girlfriends.)

You can celebrate triumphs (like graduating), or remember anniversaries, some happy (marriage) and others not so much (9-11).

We celebrate and remember a number of events in our lives. People say for every day of the year someone, somewhere, is celebrating or remembering some event.

If you look at holidays, I think August is the only month of the year (in America) where there isn’t some sort of holiday unless you add in Jewish holidays. Some months have more than one.

Some people celebrate being “over the hill”. I can remember throwing such a party for our mother when she was 30. When we hit 30, they’d moved that mark to 40. With more people living longer, I expect them to eventually move it to 50.

Wedding anniversaries are always celebrated. When I was younger, people noted the first anniversary than paid little attention until they made their silver and golden anniversaries (25 and 50 years). Today radio host Delilah will sing a special ‘anniversary’ song to anyone who calls requesting a dedication for 10 or more years of marriage. You see newspaper articles about couples who’ve made 50 years of marriage. They should do one on my aunt and uncle who’ve been married at least 60 years now. (Apparently, today it’s far more common to fall short of 10 years of marriage than it is to exceed it.) My husband and I will be celebrating 30 years in November.

But by far the most common celebration for each day of the year is someone’s birthday. People produce lists, even books, about famous people “born on this day”.  Families make videos of a child’s first birthday. (I did once but I never had a camera to do so with my other children.) They do videos to celebrate learning the gender of their unborn child. Videos of multiple life events are all over social media.

Bearing in mind just how many people could have a birthday on any given day, not long ago my son told me he’d met someone born on the same day I was. I pondered that for a minute. To the best of my knowledge, I have met exactly one other person, in my entire life, who has the same day of birth that I do. Bonnie. I’ve met dozens of people born that week, either before or after my birthday, but none born on that day. All things considered a rather amazing thing.

Of course, when it comes right down to it, nobody thinks about or remembers dates/events with no meaning to them.

We remember the bicentennial because it was such a huge celebration, but we find it hard to remember exact events from all the other July 4’s we’ve celebrated. I can remember events from the Christmas I was ten, but others are harder to distinguish.

Few people old enough to remember that day can’t remember exactly what they were doing when they heard on 9-11-2001. Just like those old enough to remember JFK’s assassination or the attack on Pearl Harbor.

We etch the biggest events in our memory forever.

 We all have such days, both big and little. The monumental ones whole nations can’t forget and the little ones that only mean something to you or your family.

So today, I’m asking you to ponder tomorrow.

Does March 19 bear any significance in your life or is it just another Thursday?

Personally, I shall always remember March 19 as the day I finally became a grandmother to my beautiful, precious, and very gorgeous first grandchild. My darling Emma May Plagmann who is one year old tomorrow. Grandma love’s Emma.

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.