Published Dec. 3, 2006 in the Hibbing Daily Tribune

Lighting the holiday season

By Aaron J. Brown

Welcome to America, where we start a season of everlasting joy with a day called “Black Friday.” Oh, but don’t worry. Our black Friday isn’t a grim harbinger of death, but refers to the accounting term “in the black,” when retail stores meet their liabilities for the year and now earn profits.

What a way to kick off a month of altruistic love! Nothing says “peace on earth” like the mental image of a well-dressed CEO making a final notation in his ledger, leaning back in his leather chair and calling his mistress to let her know he’s buying her an island nation.

We managed to avoid shopping malls during the long Thanksgiving weekend. In fact, thanks to my wife’s strong organizational skills we are completely done with our holiday shopping with only a small percentage of it taking place in traditional stores. Yes, we’re those people. It sure beats my old method of holiday shopping. I’d follow a theme in my gift selections, such as “things found on end caps” and “sale items.”

With the gifting squarely out of my hands, I take a different but equally important role during the holidays: I decorate the outside of our house. Sure, we may not live anywhere a city, or a highway, or other people. But should anyone stop by for a visit, I want them to see glowing orbs of holiday spirit even when they close their eyes. Ideally, this effect should continue for weeks or even months afterward. In this I am limited by a firm (and wise) light limit imposed by my family and my blatant, some would say dangerous lack of electrical knowledge.

In a world where some measure twice and cut once, while others use two chainsaws to eat a steak, I lean toward the latter group, especially when it comes to holiday lighting. I’ll spend hours on my lights only to end up two feet short of the outlet with nothing but strategically placed masking tape keeping the whole string from seizing up into a giant multi-colored ball. I wish I could say I get a little better each year, but things have pretty much been all downhill since I put three strings of lights on the tree in front of our old house.

I like to use the C7 lights. Most people like the little twinkling lights and some have moved entirely to rope lights, but I like the full bodied look of the C7s. I could go for the C9s, but come on … this ain’t the Champs Elysees. The problem with C7s is that they’re easy to break, especially in the cold (like Christmastime) and near hard things (like houses and the ground). A transcript of my lighting endeavor would have read like this:

ME (pleading with cheap plastic light hook): Hold, please. Hold!

LIGHT HOOK: (breaks)

C7 BULB: (breaks)

ME: (CENSORED!)

I was a little bold this year, crawling up on my roof to attach lights along the entire roofline. It was the first time I had been on my roof since we moved into the new house last year. The moment my foot left the ladder I felt like Will Ferrell’s character in the movie “Anchorman” when he says, “I instantly regret this decision.” Roofs are deceptively steep. I know plenty of roofers and other handyfolk are out there, muttering at how much of a wimp I am for saying that. Say what you will. I have yet to meet a roofer who doesn’t have a story that ends with, “and then I fell off the roof.” 

I managed to stay on the roof; in fact, the roof lights are my best work yet, even if the porch looks like a jumbled mess of glowing penguins and extension cords. It’s the holiday season and there’s no such thing as a dark night at our house.

Aaron J. Brown is a columnist for the Hibbing Daily Tribune.

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