I want to start a new national holiday. I started it in my own family when our children were young. It is called March Forth and it’s a holiday based on a pun. Today is March Fourth but pun-wise it can also be March Forth!<\/p>\n
What’s the point of the celebration, besides being the only date in the year that punnily makes a sentence? Step out! Be bold! Do something different! Risk looking foolish doing something good, something on behalf of someone else. My holiday, (hopefully someday everyone’s<\/em> holiday) will be a day for positive action. (As I write this I’m listening to Stars and Stripes Forever, of course. What else?)<\/p>\n When our children were little we played marches and tromped around the house on March Fourth and had a little fun on a day when, in the Northern Hemisphere at least, the weather is often gray and dismal, cold and wet. It is a way to brighten a moment just when winter is seeming over long and spring too far away. And why not celebrate this special day? Invariably when I ask someone if he or she knows why today is my favorite day of the year, which most people answer, “It’s your birthday?” and I say, “Nope, it’s the only date of the year that makes a sentence,” and then wait a few seconds for the good-natured dawning recognition of the joke, I always get a smile.<\/p>\n Honestly! This is an idea whose time has come. A winner. A literary holiday!\u00a0 For now, until the national campaign gets underway, I’ll just keep wishing people I meet a happy March Forth on March Fourth. I’d love it if you’d do the same.<\/p>\n (I invite you to boldly take a peek at some other March Forth essays and Past March Fourth Greetings<\/a> to our adult children and their families)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I want to start a new national holiday. I started it in my own family when our children were young. It is called March Forth and it’s a holiday based on a pun. Today is March Fourth but pun-wise it … Continue reading