The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1908-09-26
THE COMING WINTER.

There is a suggestion of frost in the atmos
phere these days. and the day is not far distant
when the leaves will begin to fall and then winter
will be here. 1t is the general belief among mer
who keep account of things that the winter i;
to be a hard winter. There will be more or les;
ideness among those who work for living anc
idleness makes it hard to provide three square
meals day for those dependent upon the worker
for food. And idleness among those who work fol
living will naturally affect business adversely and
the money will not flow in great volume into the
Golfers of the business man. Still the outlook is
more encouraging than those who only the
worst would have us believe.
Some one more or less of humorist once said
that in prosperous times the people ate their
doughnuts and saved the holes for the seasons when
doughnuts were hard to get. And there is some
truth in the line. We have no doubt been prodigal
in our expenditures during the last few years when
prosperity hung over the nation. Now that the
season has come for the consumption of the holes
of the doughnuts, we are likely to find the holes
rather slim fare. However, there is a new year
coming, and preparations for new crops are being
made all the time so that if the present winter
proves hard one, it may teach us lesson in
learn to conserve our doughnuts the holes may
have something surrounding them next time the
powers will that there shall be a season of more
less acute famine following a season of plenty.
In regard to the coming winter, that it should
be hard is the most natural thing in the world
Cold weather adds to the cost of living very large
ly. 1t would not be a very rash estimate to say
that to provide heat in the winter season of four
or five months takes all of two weeks wages from
the ordinary working man. That may be consid-
cred dead loss After the coal is burned it is like
the holes in the doughnuts. You know you have
enjoyed the coal, but there is nothing tangible
naming with which to console yourself. The
ashes a source of expense.
1t is also indsputable fact that business dur
ing years of presidential elections is always just
a little off, even in the most prosperous times
And the presidential election, following only year
after the collapse in stocks in New York which
brought the hard times or which at least pre-
ceded the hard times, does nto make for those pros
porous times which all of us enjoy as we do the
doughnuts, when we take no account of the holes
which must consume now during the leaner
portion of the year.
But we can make the coming winter very much
worse, or at least make ourselves feel very much
worse than necessary, by brooding over the fact
that the doughnuts gone, and giving over
emphasis to the ethereal quality of the holes as
food. 1t is not pleasant to know that business
men in the east report the present conditions the
worst they have known in twenty-six years, but
the knowledge should be a guide for us of the
west to live prudently, and while not engaged in
the strenuous work of providing living for our
selves and our loved Ones together with perfectly
just profits to the trusts and others who live on
profits to employ our time in devising ways and
means of making dollar do what two dollars used
to do In the pressure Of modern business, this
task will be found entertaining and profitable and
it will keep us from broodng too long on the high
cost of living and other discomforts We can at
least be cheerful for we have the richest land in
the world and we are living in one of the richest
sections of that land.
We may know that things are not just right
that peaches that sell for 50 cents bushel in the
orchard at Brigham City are not worth 50 bushel
in Salt Lake. Things like that will be remedied
some day, for such things have made the country
out of joint. But in remedying such things it is
better to approach the problems with a cheerful
nountenance and cheerful mind Gloomy fore
bodings will not settle the hard times nor right any
Of the wrongs of the day. They will not bring
back the doughnuts to surround the hole which it
is given US to eat at this time. So, in spite of
the near approach of the winter season. and in
spite of the circumstances which rather tend to
discourage u.s. let try to be cheerful and patient
and helpful to one another In this frame of mind