Thinking about those who work Christmas day
I spent some time yesterday thanking all those who were on the job, performing necessary tasks
Sitting around the house yesterday before the family descended put me in mind of the people who don’t get Christmas as a day off.
Start with cops and firefighters, add utility emergency crews that must be ready to go, transportation workers, from Septa drivers to airline pilots; those employed in hospitals along with other medical and social services, the military, postal and hotel workers, concierge staffs, and, of course, the men and women who bring you the broadcast and print news.
I was among the latter. Before I was a columnist, as a reporter and especially as a copyeditor, I was sometimes asked if I would work Christmas to allow a colleague to spend it with his family. (I am going so far back, there were no female copyeditors, at the Philadelphia Daily News, at least.)
If free, as a Jewish person, I was happy to do it.
First, to help out a colleague.
Second, because Christmas was a very slow news day. Low stress.
Not much crime on Christmas Day, because not many stores are open to rob, and burglaries are low because everyone is home. Traffic is thin. Even criminals want to spend time with their families.
The most common news event of the day were house fires, often set off by lit candles to give the room a festive light, that turned tragic.
The Daily News had a skeleton reporting staff on duty because we knew from experience there would not be much to report. And those who did work on this federal holiday received extra pay. Maybe the whole shift was overtime. I don’t really recall, and that was never my motive anyway.
There were few reporters around, and fewer first-line editors. Maybe one photographer and one artist, who retouched pictures to make them stand out when published. And one guy from the ad department to schedule ads for the next day’s paper. The whole paper was on autopilot.
The newsroom was as still as a cemetery, the pace as relaxed as a morgue. The ever-on police radio squawked only sporadically.
It was a quiet day, I am saying.
And yesterday I was reminded of those long-ago days, but I spent a minute giving silent thanks for all those unthought-of workers spending Christmas on the job, performing essential tasks.
