CHRISTMAS WEEK

Waikato Times, Volume 118, Issue 19765, 21 December 1935, Page 6

CHRISTMAS WEEK

The coming week is usually referred to as the festive season, and after a strenuous period, for the Christmas trade is for most peoeple a rush, the prospect of a holiday, however limited, is attractive. Already cars are beginning to move through the district with camp equipment visible somewhere about them, and with stores and bedding for the holiday occupying every spare inch of accommodation. For some people the holiday has begun, and each year finds more and more New Zealanders spending it in the out-of-doors. On Monday housewives will review the position and set out for town to get whatever is required and Tuesday will find a rush to get the things that always seem to be forgotten. Late on Tuesday evening tired folk will go home thankful for Christmas Day, and perhaps inclined to forget that the preparations for Christmas dinner have to be attended to by some one. The mothers of the family generally do that, tired or not, and the appetite is provided by the younger members. Christmas is essentially a family affair, and of the tens of thousands who will travel by rail or road during the next few days it can be taken for granted that no small proportion is going home. It is a good thing that a break of this kind should come, with work reduced to the essentials and everyone bent on enjoyment in one form or another. It has been a strenuous year and the improvement noted in many branches of the national life has not been achieved without persistent effort. But the coming week will afford opportunity to forget the problems, if only for a few days, and ti e rest should enable the community to face what lies ahead with renewed energy. Many things change, but fortunately the spirit of Christmas seems to be ever the same. During the past few days, owing to the generosity of many people and the willing assistance of men, women and children much has been done to give happiness to the less fortunate in the community, and if it were possiblo to record the private acts of kindness and generosity the evidence of goodivill and kindly feelings would be truly impressive. This is a proper frame of mind in which to approach the holiday season based on the things mentioned, goodwill and friendship, and perhaps when as a community we face the problems of the coming year, and strive for what we regard individually as desirable for the country, the memory of the good feelings of Christmas week may do no little service by enabling us to make due allowances and always to give credit for good intentions.