Just came today:
"Easy to scorn, the holiday letter still hard to give up" by Beth Teitell | Globe Staff, December 20, 2013
When the mail arrives at her Andover home, Chris Williams eagerly searches for the holiday letters. She’s eager to read updates from family and friends — but she also has darker motives. She and pals hold a snarky annual competition for the worst holiday letter, and she’s hoping for a winner.
“Bragging is the key to winning,” she said of the letters, “but revealing sensitive or inappropriate information also earns points.”
But here’s the thing about Chris Williams. She’s not just a mocker. She’s a potential mockee. Yes, the woman who pokes fun at others’ letters sends out a holiday letter of her own.
“The older I get,” the 50-year-old said, “the more I realize that life is short, and it’s important to take the time to share the good times with the people you love.”
You’d think by now the holiday letter would be a relic, derided to extinction, or rendered obsolete by the year-round over-sharing opportunities offered by social media. But even in 2013, when eye-rolling about holiday letters has become a winter sport, many still feel called to the keyboard....
Hello, readers.
Letters, of course, aren’t the only holiday correspondence with the power to enrage. As the Kardashians and JP Morgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon have proved, the right photo can also do the job. At a time when many Americans are suffering financially, and Dimon’s bank has been involved in scandal, his holiday card shows him and his family batting around tennis balls in their opulent apartment. “Maddeningly Tone-Deaf,” Time magazine called it. “Looks like a Ralph Lauren advertisement,” added Quartz, the business news site....
And who else does the Globe get cards from?
Annie Blatz, a realtor from Brewster....
Kathy Baron, an organization development consultant at Harvard University....
Joan Malkin, a retired lawyer....
Laura Zigman, a best-selling author and publicist for Happier, a Boston-based wellness company....
Jenn Menn, a biblical counselor in Cambridge....
--more--"
Time for me to get my cards in the mail.
