Ebenezer Scrooge and Bob Cratchit comes to the attention of us all at this time of the year.

All of us have enjoyed the movie over the years.

This year is certainly no exception as a lot of homes are feeling old Scrooge more and more as their savings have disappeared, they have lost their home, their jobs and lots more.

The economy has left a devastating effect on many, many this past year. Here is Russell County, we are sure many have felt the woes of the economy but still we have not had the large loss of jobs, the closing of large factories and stores that many communities have felt.

This community can be thankful for our banks. Local banks are strong and continue to support this area and their customers with services and security. Our industrial community has

had to make some adjustments but at this point we have not experienced devastating changes and we can only pray this does not happen here. We do have many jobs that are tied to the struggling auto industry and we must expect changes will likely come to us as our national auto industry make further adjustments. Again, we can only pray they are not major.

The woes of this economy have left very few unattended as it has reached all across the board from the smallest to the largest. Instead of following Scrooge around we must take our lessons from Bob Cratchit and take a look in the opposite direction.

We were reminded of this last week when we attended a Christmas Party of Westlake Hospital. The party was over and the clean-up crew was cleaning up the left over food and scrap wrapping paper when one of the clean-up men came over to their CEO Rusty Tungate and simply said, “I want to thank you for my job, and want you to know how much I appreciate it.” This much we can take from this worker and from Bob Cratchit.

We can be grateful just to have a job, any job. We don’t need money, stuff or status to be happy. Cratchit was grudge free, even defending his miserable employer against Mrs. Cratchit's reasonable resentments. He found pleasure simply in the company of his family. The Cratchits had no health insurance and a family member who had a pre-existing

medical condition. May this special season we all should be filled with the simple pleasures of life and the real spirit of Christmas. May God bless you and your family and may you have special joys this Christmas season.