Major League Baseball is on hold in the wake of the Coronavirus and could stay that way well into the summer.
Meanwhile, the Christmas season waits nine months ahead of this COVID-19 cursed spring.
The two concepts somehow came together this week to inspire a way for people to defy the current virus threat by shedding a little sparkling light on their communities.
Milwaukee Brewers announcer Lane Grindle used Twitter to urge Americans to put their holiday lights ... [+]
Milwaukee Brewers radio announcer Lane Grindle is back home with MLB’s Spring Training games cancelled out in Arizona. As he and his wife engaged in the same self-quarantine procedures all Americans are asked to use to fight COVID-19, they watched as their neighbors bunkered down in their homes — socially cut off from friends and extended family.
Grindle and his wife had an idea, and the play-by-play man turned to social media to get the possibility out to the world. A March 15 note on his Twitter feed reads: “What if we all put our Christmas lights back up? Then we could get in the car and drive around and look at them. That seems like a fair social distancing activity.”
It reads like a passing fancy — a joke aimed at cheering people up a bit when reading their daily tweets. Some of Grindle’s Twitter followers didn’t take it as a mere gag, and they headed outside to get their holiday displays lit up again.
Milwaukee Brewers baseball is on hold, but one of the franchise's announcers urges Americans to get ... [+]
By St. Patrick’s Day, news found its way back to Grindle via those same social media channels that folks were taking his idea very seriously. As images began springing up online of homes wearing holly, jolly decorations in March, he would celebrate in joyful disbelief on Twitter: “Folks, people are really doing this!”
A simple hashtag search for #Christmaslights now brings up a steady stream of would-be decorators from across the U.S. detailing their efforts to restore some festive festooning to their yards, homes, apartment windows, etc. As the “all is calm, all is bright” idea works its way through neighborhoods, social media users are employing different tags such as #coronakindness and #lightsforlife to call attention to their early spring reindeer games. Many participants throw in a joke about how easy it is for them to turn their yard’s clock back to December because they never took their lights down properly in the first place.
There’s no word yet if this Santa show of morale could lead to other acts of anti-viral defiance. If you hear fireworks in the night or spot a jack-o-lantern or two on the porch next door, you’ll have your answer.
