Season to help others

The season was setting up to be a holly jolly Christmas.

The peninsula had just been dumped on with upwards to 30-centimeters of snow late in November. But then a typical South Coast monsoon hit the area melting all that white stuff.

Hey, we’re used to this weather though and many of us don’t really want it anyway.

And then Ocean Choice International dropped the axe on its Marystown fish plant saying it was closing the facility immediately and leaving 240 people without work. At the same time, it’s considering reopening the Fortune fish plant year round to double up on present employment to 110 people.

Peter Kiewit Offshore in Marystown has an opportunity to bid on a major module related to the Hebron offshore development, with the company now preparing an inventory of workers who would be available to return to work at Cow Head this upcoming spring.

Then we have community Christmas Tree light ups, concerts, Santa Claus parades, Christmas socials/parties, family visits and of course every time you turn on the radio or step into a store now Christmas carols are catching your ear.

Another indication Christmas is getting near and residents are feeling that Christmas sensation, is the number of Santa Claus letters the Southern Gazette received this year. Our number of letters has increased after a slowdown came about a decade ago.

The indication then was once the SeaRose sailed out of Mortier Bay, so too did the jobs Marystown shipyard workers and fish plant workers had enjoyed. A lot of the letters arriving then were being written by grandparents.

Christmas is a time though to allow the stress of everyday work/life to ease for a few moments, as we put our lives into perspective.

Take it easy on that credit card as well. Newfoundlanders and Labradorians are known to be very generous people – it’s inbred as their relatives of days gone by looked after everyone in their community.

In many communities whatever one family enjoyed – food, clothing, household goods, etc. – was shared to other families less fortunate.

Some of that generosity is reflected in residents’ support of Samaritan Purse Christmas Gift Boxes for children in third world countries, the Happy Tree project, family aid services, food banks and ministerial associations as they strive through the support of residents to ensure a youngster does not wake Christmas morning without a gift under the tree or a proper dinner on the table.

Residents should take stock of what their lives have been offered over the past year(s) and remind themselves there is often someone else worse off or in more dire straits.

Helping others is what the Christmas season is all about. Despite skepticism that may arise, the new year always manages to take care of itself.

George Macvicar, Editor/Manager