Christmas cat

It's holiday time again; the season of celebrations. While this time of year can be uber-stressful, it is also time to light candles, decorate trees, sing songs and do whatever the heck you do when you celebrate Kwanzaa.\nPeople sometimes make a big deal about the authenticity of holidays. It's generally accepted that Jesus probably wasn't born Dec. 25, any in-depth discussion of Hanukkah will uncover that it is not as important as Rosh Hashana or other Jewish holidays, and Kwanzaa was created in 1966 as a cultural celebration, not a religious one.\nBut don't worry; I'm not going Scrooge on you.\nNone of this takes away from the presents under the Christmas tree, the soft glow of the Hanukkah candles or the Kwanzaaness of Kwanzaa.\nDespite of the stress of finals, gift giving and family get-togethers, the holidays take on a festive life of their own (think Frankenstein), and I think this can best be illustrated through my cat Molly.\nMolly loves Christmas. Now, I am not implying that Molly has made a spiritual decision to celebrate Christmas and not Hanukkah (seeing as how my family celebrates both) or some other religious celebration; it's just that Christmas decorations, especially the tree, seem to excite her more than others.\nCase in point: Every year my Dad and I drag our fake tree down from the attic. The tree breaks into three (not so) easy-to-assemble parts. Last year we decided to bring down the bottom part and set it up first, then return upstairs to curse at the rest of the tree.\nBy the time we brought the middle section downstairs, Molly was already lying underneath the uncompleted bottom third. From that point on, she hardly left her plastic forest getaway until the day we dragged the tree back up to the attic.\nI dare say that the "deforestation" of the living room is the low point of Molly's life every year.\nMy dog Maggie seems to enjoy Christmas, too, which is surprising to me. I would have thought Halloween would be her favorite since it's her designated birthday (we don't know her real one), and she has lots of little kids that come visit and pet her. However, she seems to be less than thrilled about being dressed up as a witch every year and having the whole family sit around and laugh at her for an hour. But I digress. \nMolly (the cat) seems to be high on catnip 24/7 during December. She's often found frolicking around the house and doing flips in the middle of the floor (which can be rather amusing since she's a pretty fat cat).\nSo how can you apply a life lesson learned from an overweight cat? Take a deep breath, stop worrying and put down those books for a while (after all, Molly doesn't worry about her final grades). Walk down to the square and look at all the lights. On a clear night they are amazing, and if it's snowing, even if just a little bit, the scene looks like it's been stolen right out of a movie. \nAnd we all deserve a walk down a picturesque street from time to time, don't you agree?