We hear from some of our readers that they want to read nice stories and happy news. Fair enough.
It’s a time year of when we all need to lighten up. We’ve made it through the trials and tribulations of a challenging year, and we all need a break. Tell me something that will make me smile, they say, something that will lighten my psychic load.

So, by popular demand, this paper is full of happy news. Mostly about the various Christmas parades held across the Pontiac over the weekend where we saw jolly Santas pop up in all corners of the county, bundled up for an hour of sitting in the cold on a float, waving enthusiastically, calling out Christmas greetings to the parade watchers, with a special Ho Ho Ho for children young and old.

We’ve seen parade organizers marshalling floats, people firing up generators to power the lights, others adding last-minute decorations, volunteers serving hot chocolate and hot dogs and, of course, the spectators lining the streets and cheering the passing parade. Stand back and look at page 8 and you will see community spirit in all its glory, alive and well throughout the Pontiac.

Elsewhere in the paper you will see there was a radio play performed in Bristol, Shawville and Quyon and an auction of decorated Christmas trees in Shawville, not to mention the second sitting of a holiday market in Otter Lake. All good fun.

But what about the other news? Well, you’ll find that here too, and it’s generally pretty good.

A couple of municipalities will reduce the size of their councils, the SQ tells us collisions and crime are down, and a significant donation has been made to the very deserving food bank.

Then there’s the week’s letters to the editor which, as is often the case, offer commentary on how the affairs of the county are being handled.

Love it or hate it, these are all part of a community newspaper, not just the feel-good stories we know are popular, but also the stories that help us all track how we are progressing as a society. Because our job is not to lull everyone into complacency, but to try to inform our readers on what is going on in our little corner of the world, the good, the bad and the in-between.

It’s a bit like a weekly mini state-of-the-union speech. How else can we as citizens fulfill our civic responsibilities when it comes time to vote or choose what good causes to support.

And a newspaper works both ways, informing its readers, on one hand, and giving our elected officials a means to take the temperature of the community they represent, on the other.

In other words, we all look to newspapers to get a dose of reality, neither sugar-coated nor doom and gloom, something along the lines of how the late great Walter Cronkite used to sign off his evening newscast: ‘And that’s the way it is.’