When the word Christmas is said, what do you think of? Food, or presents, or even family, but I can guarantee you that you probably don’t think of lights. Well I do. Actually I think of different kinds of lights all year. In the summer, as the head reporter for Wonderful Winter Lights, I’m thinking about where the best place for July 4 fireworks are. In the winter, all I think about are the lights that will be going up very soon in many peoples’ houses, and which are the best. After all, lights are very important to many people. Why is it though, that these people go overboard? Is it tradition? Is it love of the holiday? Is it to satisfy an ego? Well I went out into the field (a famous house that has been hanging Christmas lights for 38 years now), to find the answer to these questions and more.
Christmas Lights
When I went to meet the owner of the house above, I was awestruck by the numerous lights and decorations they had put up this year. Making last year’s dazzling shower of lights look like nothing, and this year’s array of lights lit up the night sky brightly for miles and miles around. When asked why the family puts up the Christmas lights every year, they said it started 38 years ago when the father and son duo - John Phipher and Tom Phipher, started putting the lights up during the height of Vietnam and the Cold War. The joy they saw it brought to peoples’ faces was enough for them to put it up the next year, and the year after that, until now they have done it for 38 years. Another owner of the house (on the next page) said that he put up the lights every year because when he was a kid, he realized that a little entertainment could go a long way. His parents grew up with the same belief and now he has an amazing plethora of lights to help light up the sky, and make everyone happy.