The Student News Site of Gannon University since 1947

THE GANNON KNIGHT

The Student News Site of Gannon University since 1947

THE GANNON KNIGHT

The Student News Site of Gannon University since 1947

THE GANNON KNIGHT

Holidays lose spark without candles’ comforting glow

While picking through the tightly-packed plastic bin of Christmas decorations in my parents’ basement, I just couldn’t put my finger on why I found it difficult to decide which housewarming holiday trinkets to bring back to school with me.

Abby Badach, editor-in-chief

Of course I love the tiny wooden gingerbread man figurines and my miniature Christmas tree (complete with miniature ornaments) – and nothing feels better beneath my stocking feet than the handmade latch hook Santa rug my great-grandma made more than 20 years ago.

But even those beloved things didn’t send visions of sugarplums dancing in my head.

Then it hit me: I needed candles. That’s what was missing. All my favorite Christmas decorations involve candles.

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Unfortunately, candles are Grade-A contraband at pretty much any college one attends.

Before you send Doug Zimmerman or Sue Majocka knocking at my door, let me explain that I know full well why. Candles do present a fire hazard, anywhere – especially in a high-rise building packed with teens and twentysomethings.

My olfactory system, though, doesn’t respond well to reason.

I smell a chocolate chip cookie and I help myself to not one, but a baker’s dozen. I catch a whiff of a freshly raked pile of leaves and yearn to be 7 again, when it was socially acceptable to roll around in them.

Although self-control keeps me from gaining 500 pounds or getting fatally poked in the eye by an acorn stem, I can’t help but feel an intense emotional connection to my sense of smell.

When I was digging around in our family’s stash of holiday décor, I twisted the lid off of our prized “Winter Wonderland” jar candle and was enveloped in the scent of Christmas pouring out.

It smelled like peppermint, just-out-of-the-oven coffee cake and a generous pinch of pine.

But their smell only scratches the surface of why I love Christmas candles so much.

Few things top the gentle glow of a flickering candle on a cold night. Try as they might, the flameless drugstore varieties just don’t pack the same punch with their little pointy plastic fame.

I scoff at their weak attempt.

We, as human beings, yearn for the comfort of warm fire to get us through a cold winter. It’s in our blood. Ever hear of a TV program called “The Yule Log?”  In 1966, WPIX-TV in New York City began airing a two-hour loop of burning logs in a fireplace on Christmas Eve or Christmas morning as a gift to those living without fireplaces in tiny New York apartments.

The special was canceled in the early 1990s because the station couldn’t bear the cost of running the two-hour program without commercial interruption. However, a groundswell effort starting in March 2000 called the “Bring Back the Log Campaign” prompted the station to have a change of heart in 2001, when it began broadcasting a digitally restored version of the well-loved program.

The Yule Log has won the ratings in its time slot ever since. WPIX now even offers a “Portable Yule Log” downloadable movie on its website for travelers on the go.

College students – not to mention faculty and staff – have to be feeling burnt out at this time of year, whether it’s from projects, papers or final exams. So take a minute to rekindle your own fire.

Just make sure to keep those embers and open flames out of campus housing.

ABBY BADACH

[email protected]

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