Source: Newseum.org
Happy Holidays everyone. Whether you’ve recently celebrated Chanukah, or are getting ready to leave milk and cookies out for Santa, this is the time of year when (hopefully) you’ve completed Open Enrollment, the potential HR nightmare – the annual office holiday party – is said and done, and you can just take a few moments to sit back and actually enjoy your co-workers, friends, and family. With any luck at all, you’ll get a few days off to relax and celebrate, abandon thoughts of work and responsibility in favor of egg nog and days filled with football games. So, in the spirit of the season, I offer up two gifts to you: one old and one new.
The old gift is the most reprinted editorial in history, originally printed in 1897 in the New York Sun: a letter from little Virginia O’Hanlon, and answered unsigned by Francis Pharcellus Church, who assures Virginia that yes, indeed, there is a Santa Claus.
“DEAR EDITOR: I am 8 years old.
“Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus.
“Papa says, ‘If you see it in THE SUN it’s so.’
“Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?“VIRGINIA O’HANLON.
“115 WEST NINETY-FIFTH STREET.”VIRGINIA, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except [what] they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge…”
The new gift is given to us by Stanley Bing at the Bing Blog, who assures Santa Claus that yes, 112 years later, there are still Virginias in the world.
“DEAR BLOGGER: I am very old and live at the North Pole. All of my little friends up here say that there is no Virginia any more. Mrs. Claus says that if I see it on the your website, it’s so. Please tell me the truth: Is there a Virginia? Signed, Chris (Santa) Claus, 115 Workshop Way, North Pole.
CHRIS, your little friends are wrong. They have been consuming too much media, and have been infected by the material that gains the most attention there. They do not believe that which doesn’t rise to the top of the search stack or get the highest ratings 18-49. They think that nothing exists but that which is measured by hits, twitters and chatter, or makes its way by other means to the top of our collective mind…”
Thank you, Mr. Church and Mr. Bing, for reminding us that with all the chaos and stress in the world, seeing isn’t believing – believing is seeing.
Happy Holidays everyone, and from all of us here at the Precept Employee Benefits Blog, we wish you a happy, safe, healthy, and prosperous New Year.
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