Fruits of the Season

First, Happy Hanukkah! To all our Jewish readers. Today is the 25th day of Kislev in the Hebrew calendar, when Jewish people celebrate the re-dedication of the Holy Second Temple of Jerusalem during the time of the Maccabees. It's also known as the Festival of Lights, and one of its many traditions is the lighting of the Menorah, a special nine-branched candelabra. The candles are lit in succession on each of the eight nights of Hanukkah. The Menorah is one of the most widely recognized—and loveliest—symbols of Jewish ceremonial art. Of course it's also the 24th of December in the Gregorian calendar, the day before the feast of Christmas.

I've received many nice calendars, cards, and self-published books from TOP readers this holiday season, as I do every year, and I just wanted to say a big "thanks!" to everyone for sending those along. It's a pleasure to see peoples' work and I appreciate all the good wishes.

One of the things I receive is the Annual from Joseph O. Holmes. There are only 100 copies this year, but in the future I'd like to see if I can possibly help make Joe's Annual accessible in a limited way to TOP readers who might want to see it. Joe works on it "in his head" all year, and does such a nice job. There are others whose work I greatly enjoy seeing too, of course; I don't want to seem to play favorites.

Rob Strong, who I wrote about in the previous post, had another nice idea for self-publishing work—a set of postcards. These could be sold as a set, used for self-promotion, or simply sent as personalized message postcards or as individual promotional mailers. If well calculated, this is a versatile idea.

Oh, but now I'm shading into discussing mammon, and that will never do, on this first day of Hanukkah and the day of Christmas Eve.

Best wishes, good health and good cheer, and happy holidays to all!

Mike

Original contents copyright 2016 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Comments

[Nigel]

Happy Christmas, Mike.
(It's just past midnight in the UK.)

[Ben Rosengart]

Thanks, Mike. It's nice to be thought of.

I hope you have a pleasant holiday, if you celebrate one.

[Ari]

Mike, a correction (or two):
The 25th of Kislev actually coincides with December 25, this year. Just as the night of December 24 is Christmas Eve, the night of Kislev 24 is the eve of Kislev 25, which is the first day of Chanukah. A 24-hour "day" in the Hebrew calendar officially begins at the preceding sundown, so the candles for the first day of Chanukah are lit the night before.
Also, the Menorah that is most commonly depicted in Jewish art and artifacts typically has seven branches, after the one that was used in the temple at Jerusalem. The one used on Channukka has nine.

[Eamon Hickey]

I have mixed feelings about Joe Holmes's photographs. I love how good they are, but they put my own mediocre efforts in too sharp relief. Naturally, I blame him for that. The problem is that Joe covers a lot of the same ground that I do when I'm out and about with a camera (New York City). So when I look at his work, I see lots of places I've been and scenes that I've encountered, or rather could have encountered if I had more gumption, only they look way better in his pictures than in mine.

In fact, I've thought about him many times in the past month as I see Christmas Tree vendors all over the city. He did a nice series of portraits of them a few years back. It almost goes without saying that I have never made a good picture of one.

I've mentioned it in previous comments, but I wrote a short profile of Joe for Rob Galbraith's now-shuttered web site, if anyone wants to learn a little bit more about Joe (although parts of the piece are a bit dated).

[Kivi Shaps]

Happy Chanukah and Festive Greetings to all.

[Joe Holmes]

Mike and Eamon, you're too sweet -- thanks!