Christmas is almost upon us. What it mainly means to me is that I get to see my daughter for about 10 days and be her dad. I get to see my parents and be their kid. Everything else feels pretty extraneous right now.

It’s amazing how hard humanity works to create so many different early winter-solstice holidays for feasting and celebrating. It all feels like whistling in the dark to me; like we’re all encouraging one another to keep up our spirits before the dark and cold descend with all their fury. Maybe it only feels that way because I’ve started getting used to Pennsylvania winters?

At any rate, I hope everybody has an excellent holiday season, whatever holiday it may be for you.

But if you don’t know how already, you just may want to learn to whistle.