After a season of rain and flood, the sun came out in time for Christmas, here in this place where we dream of clear, starry nights for the Yuletide instead of sleigh bells glistening in the snow.
Thirty years ago we wrote to our readers at Christmas to be careful in their travels. A small newspaper in a small town, we wrote, holds every reader dear, holds every friend in care.
We are no longer little farm towns here, rural subdivisions and quaint little post offices that need but half a name and a partial address to deliver a New Year’s card. We are sprawling and complex, growing so fast that we sometimes seem uncoordinated, as if our communities’ legs and arms are at war with one another, a hot-headed adolescent of a place, striving for success, wanting to fit in, eager to stand out, determined to stand alone – full of contradiction, and the promise of beauty, and more than a trace of acne.
We are communities, plural, and yet, somehow, we believe, palpably one.
The same might be said for our national collection of states, and peoples, this holiday, this presidential election season. We are Catholics, once hunted by emperors, who then themselves hunted Protestants, and Mormons, once hounded by mobs, and we are Jews once persecuted by kings and dictators, and Hindus, once suppressed, and atheists once outlawed, and Buddhists on the run from torture in Tibet. And we are Muslims, a tiny minority here, perhaps, misunderstood by many, hated by some, but welcome in this strong, free country, this place of grace and courage, this place of refuge, this nation, this state, that enshrined above all else freedom of thought and speech and worship.
Happy holidays, dear readers, to those of you who light candles for Hanukkah or for Kwanzaa. Blessings to you and yours for the new year, and a light be upon your house this solstice time, in these, the darkest days of winter.
And for those of you who believe Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ, and for those who believe instead he was a prophet in the line to Mohammed; for those of you who will be at mass, or at mosque, and also for those who celebrate the season mostly as the coming of St. Nick and his bag of gifts unto others, well, have a care in your holiday travels. We are a small newspaper still, if not so small as once, and our readers are no less dear.
This place we call home needs all of us who have faith in each other and the future. There is work to be done. Merry Christmas, and may peace be upon you.
The Barton Family, on behalf of our stockholders and staff
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