The term "Black Friday" did not exist through much of my life. I'd be broadly guessing as to when it began. The longer one's life, the harder it can become to pin things down in time. I remember being immediately put-off by the term. How to expand on my feelings about that? I groped for words on this once, then got a little help from a fellow traveler in journalism in this part of the state. From Glenwood actually.
My old fellow travelers have been following me into retirement or at least into our more disengaged days. So John Stone wrote a column where he reflected my feelings on "Black Friday." Put-off like me, he wrote that the term sounded "somber" rather than uplifting. There's the word I was looking for! I'd like to think that normally I can fetch the right word.
So we'd hear the term "Black Friday" in the run-up to the weekend that through my youth was only known for Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving was truly the event. It was just common sense that the day after would be a good time to go to Alexandria for an outing, checkbook at the ready. The days before debit cards!
Oh, it's quite the faux pas to make the Alexandria reference, at least by the standards of our Chamber of Commerce. Or, should I say what passes for our Chamber of Commerce here in Motown. Is it merely vestigial?
Morris does not seem the hotspot for retail business activity. Maybe in fact we have stopped trying. We have decided here in Motown to define ourselves in other ways.
I have these thoughts after having visited our business district on Friday. Yes on "Black Friday," what is presumed to be the most hectic day of the year for business and shopping activity. It's probably not just a media-fueled myth, but in order to appreciate it you probably have to visit the so-called "big box stores." This calls for another reference to Alexandria. Alex has the shopping assets right in line with that, all the bells and whistles you might say.
So I'm guessing that Wal-Mart and Target were abuzz. It's just a guess because maybe the "Black Friday" reputation is inflated, or maybe it has experienced some decline. Why the heck is this one day late in November deemed so essential for crowding into stores and buying "stuff?"
Christmas gifts? We have a whole month yet. I would argue the whole concept of Christmas gifts is overrated. How do you really know what a loved one would want or appreciate? How much Christmas gift money really ends up more or less wasted - stuff that people don't really need or want? Mere "notions." Showing love hardly requires this gesture on our part. Give people money and they'll go out and get things that for sure they will appreciate.
Is Christmas overrated? We don't know the date of Christ's birth anyway. Our Christ-centered Christmas grew out of a pagan holiday. I learned that back in the '70s from Garner Ted Armstrong who was ahead of his time with the kind of talk radio show that he presented.
Our public institutions like schools cannot touch the connection between Christ and any "holiday." I think that's totally understandable. It's understandable especially in light of how Christianity in America year 2023 has taken on such a political tone. The "Christianity" as embraced in most of America now is right wing, getting more entrenched that way all the time.
The trend has taken over in spades here in rural western Minnesota. First Lutheran Church's last full-time pastor put himself forward as someone adhering to some left-of-center principles. Could I live with that? Oh I could personally accept it but I could sense his inclinations might be an actual kiss of death for my First Lutheran Church. It appears my fears have been borne out in that regard.
Christian pastors have become hesitant and even fearful, about their own careers, if they quote from Jesus Christ's Sermon on the Mount. Our Savior was hardly the type who would get on board with MAGA and Trump.
So strange, our inclinations as human beings. We try to put Christ above all else (except maybe Trump) but then we'll lodge grievances about hearing some of the actual quotes from Our Savior. Oh, "liberal" and "woke." Those type of protestations. I might assume this type of attitude is a faddish thing, to fade and become a source of embarrassment someday. I'd like to just assume that. But I am genuinely fearful in this "holiday season" of 2023.
Are we going through the motions, merely, with "holiday cheer" as our subconscious impulse tells us we really aren't that "Christian?" Have we fallen for the pied piper-like effect of "conservative media?" The steady diet of which we get from 95 percent of AM Radio? And now we have a serious congressional candidate from out here in the rural hinterlands who is more conservative than our incumbent election-denying office-holder Michelle Fischbach.
So will Fischbach start to be described as a moderate or even a liberal? Is the fever going to break? The challenger says "life begins at conception." Now that you know that, I need not review for you all of his other policy positions. It's all very consistent.
Did we really need the abortion issue thrust at us again, thanks to the Supreme Court ruling which had some justices appearing to contradict past statements or pledges? Kavanaugh? "I like beer."
Funny thing about staunch abortion opponents. It appears as merely an act by them. By that I mean sometimes there's a news item about an abortion foe having been discovered to have paid for an abortion for a lover. By the same token, when a staunch abortion foe finds there is someone in their family circle who is having issues with a pregnancy, calling for consideration of abortion, they'll do an about-face and be sympathetic with that family member. Do as I say, not as I do?
But the "pro-life" position sells so well, right? And the evangelicals love Trump so much even though he just recently referred to the evangelicals of Iowa as "pieces of shit." Oh, he'll get their votes anyway. There is no rational basis for understanding why. God didn't intend for us flawed mortals to figure all these things out, n'est-ce pas?
"Black Friday" in Morris
To complete my little story of going downtown on so-called "Black Friday," well I was on bike and pulled up to a building where I was going to do some business. Businesses would really be "hopping" on this day, right? Ahem. . . There were no cars parked around the building. In a small town we pay attention to where the cars are, or where they are not.
I walked up to the door, pulled, and of course it was locked!
Meals on Wheels was closed for Friday too. Why? Don't the meal recipients have a need? What are they supposed to do over the full four days? So that's it: business and normal operations will be shutting down, ironically, on this day noted for bustling activity.
Many people will like the "four-day weekend."
I stopped in to Sarlettes Music where Del observed there were no cars parked on main street. Main street! What does it even mean anymore? It meant a lot when I was a kid. So, we do not have a real main street in the traditional sense, plus we have no big box stores. What do we have then?
- Brian Williams - morris mn minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com
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