Disturbing changes are taking place in the world today. For example, have you noticed that someone has quietly switched out the corks in wine bottles, replacing them with rubber plugs? Have you heard about a cork tree shortage? I haven’t, but I recently purchased several moderately priced bottles of wine that came complete with rubber plugs, so I’m not delusional.
If this diabolical scheme continues, the corkscrew, a device for extracting the cork from a bottle of wine, will probably be renamed the rubberplugscrew, resulting in a new inquiry from wine sommeliers of the world: “Does monsieur wish to sniff the rubber plug?”
“Uh, yeah, sure. Gee, it smells like vintage Goodyear, with a hint of poodle pee.”
There are a lot of other menacing changes taking place. Perhaps you’ve noticed someone’s been adding more holidays to the calendar. Americans are obsessed with creating days to commemorate stuff. The mere mention of the word holiday causes the U.S. Postal Service to shut down like a contaminated oyster. In fact, there’s a direct connection between post office closures and sales events at big department stores.
Society enjoys two primary benefits from this obvious conspiracy between government and private enterprise: We’re relieved from our daily dose of junk mail, and we save a few bucks at Dillard’s. Perhaps that’s why we tend to support this trend. No one seems to know who’s responsible for all the new holidays, but I suspect a cagey old banker who plays a lot of golf.
In the beginning, there were the Big Three Holidays: Christmas, Easter and Publisher’s Clearing House Prize Award Day, when Ed McMahon broke down doors and gave away money.
Three major annual holidays weren’t good enough, however, so the Pilgrims invited the neighbors over, fired up the grill, served a few brews and watched a game, thereby inventing Super Bowl Sunday, which was misnamed Thanksgiving and has subsequently come to be the time when we swim upstream to home base, lay eggs and die. No, wait, that’s Salmon Season Day. I get confused.
The way I see it, even in my confused state, Thanksgiving is a good idea on paper but, in practice, leaves a lot to be desired. In the first place, many people aren’t thankful for driving great distances to spend an entire day with obnoxious family members. Also, Thanksgiving is a holiday loosely based on guilt. We feel guilty if we don’t attend, and when we do, we overindulge and feel guilty about eating too much. It’s a “no-win” holiday.
Just last month I struggled through another guilt-inducing holiday. Nope, it wasn’t Presidents’ Day or Groundhog Day. I don’t get guilty about forgetting those. It was Valentine’s Day, an annual event originally co-inspired by chocolate makers and greeting card publishers but now sponsored by Viagra.
Each year I suffer through my own hellish version of a Chicago-style St. Valentine’s Day Massacre. This year, I forgot to send cards to my granddaughters, which is inexcusable because they sent one to me. I’ll not forget them next February, but I’ll forget someone else; that’s precisely why I’m opposed to adding more national holidays.
Let’s quickly run down the current holiday list. What does it say about a culture that collectively wakes up every New Year’s Day with a painful hangover? That’s how we start the New Year, all the while wondering why distant peoples don’t want to live like we do.
Once, George Washington’s and Abraham Lincoln’s birthdays were official holidays that afforded two school-free days in February. Then, in a rare move to simplify things, Congress combined the two events under one name, Presidents’ Day, thereby creating even larger traffic jams at malls.
I’m tired of holidays being legislated onto my calendar. If it were up to me, March would contain one nationally recognized holiday: Kite Day – attendance mandatory. I would withdraw April 15 altogether or, in lieu of Tax Day, proclaim a new, fun holiday like National Squirt Gun Day in its place.
Here’s another suggestion: devote every single day in May to celebrate Mother’s Month and do the same for Dad in June.
From a patriot’s view, Independence Day, July 4, is the single most important day of the year, ample reason to consider devoting early July to a gigantic week-long
consolidation of all patriotically themed holidays: Memorial Day, Flag Day, Presidents’ Day, Veterans Day, etc. Early July is perfectly timed for this, and the weather’s great. Besides, not much work gets done that week anyway.
Speaking of slowdowns, in my opinion, August should be declared Siesta Month as a tribute to neighboring Mexico. A portion of each sweltering day should be devoted to napping. Please write to your congressman about this.
Early September has a designated national holiday, too, either Labor Day or Memorial Day. I get them confused. Designating these holidays as Start of Summer and End of Summer would help me a lot.
Keep Halloween in October, but make the wearing of costumes compulsory.
November would work better for everyone if Thanksgiving were moved to the early part of the month. Under the current arrangement, getting home for Thanksgiving is double-tough for those of us who also travel back for Christmas four weeks later. Moving the date to early November also would make it easier for people to attend Thanksgiving in disguise because they could wear their Halloween costumes.
December makes us squirrelier than usual because we’re guilty about not having enough money to buy everyone expensive Christmas gifts. This guilt brings on stress. Bill Gates could fix this by sending everyone some of his money. Then we’d name a holiday after him. Gates Day would fit nicely into early December.
If all else fails, we could get Congress to proclaim a new holiday in memory of the cork that once came in wine bottles. Cork Day sounds like a grand event to me.
Bob May is former managing partner of five local radio properties and is now engaged in the publishing of large-print phone directories in about 50 small towns in southwest Missouri.
