CHRISTMAS
Christmas doesn’t come on the twenty-fifth of December. It begins with the first cold, snappy day, when ladies, fur-coated, and with unaccustomed red noses patter down Broadway. Tall fragrant pine trees, their branches roped in, are piled on the curbs. There are little stacks of very, very green stands, leaning against a box of rosy cheeked apples. Delivery boys bustle about, much more energetically than ever before. In the windows cauliflowers and half frozen beets cuddle in a bed of red crepe paper in an attempt to keep warm and cheerful. Next door the fish-man has garnished his wares with holly and eked a “Merry Christmas” on the frosty window pane. On the corner the Salvation Army girl stamps to keep warm and tinkles her little bell.
And it’s not even December twenty-fourth!