I can honestly say that January is my least favorite month of the year. In addition to the natural letdown of the holiday season officially ending, it is the coldest, deadest time of the year.



The festive Christmas lights on the homes and in the stores disappear to be replaced by white sales--how boring is that?



Everything just looks so forlorn--the grass is an ugly brown; the trees are leafless.



The temperature is usually downright frigid, even in the South with Spring still too far in the future even to contemplate.



There's not a single holiday to break the monotony, unless you count Martin Luther King Day....and I don't. Call me biased, but I just have never understood why Martin Luther King's birthday deserves a national holiday.



Aside from giving his famous speech, there were many others-- Malcolm X, Rosa Parks and Medgar Evers come immediately to mind--who did as much, if not more.



I never much cared for the man when he was alive, so I certainly don't intend to celebrate him in death. I always felt he did as much harm to the Civil Rights Movement as he did good.



I also never cared for his double standard morally; he and Jesse Jackson are cut from the same cloth in that regard.



Well, I never meant to get on a rant about MLK. But, I have to have something to talk about in January, and I guess that's as good as any.



I do have some January birthdays to break the monotony a little. My younger brother, whom I lost five years ago, was born January 6. His daughter's (my niece) birthday is January 7 and Holly's birthday is the 28th.



That will help a little. Mostly, it's just hunker down and pray for February.












posted on Jan 3, 2011 9:59 AM (PST)