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Hundreds of people gathered for Poughkeepsie’s Festival of Lights parade on Friday, Nov. 30 on Main Street, creating feelings of goodwill – and a business boost for local shops.
“This is a great parade,” said City of Poughkeepsie resident Ann Marie Jones, who was watching it for the first time, along with her 3-year-old son Colin. Some people make it routine to attend the event, including fellow resident Kelly Emmett.
“Every year for the last 12 to 13 years, I’ve been coming here,” she said. Emmett added that the event wasn’t as crowded as in years’ past. Last year’s event was cancelled because of heavy winds.
Since 1994, the Bardavon, business and city-sponsored Festival of Lights has brightened up the city as the holidays begin. Teams of volunteers from the City of Poughkeepsie, with support from the Bardavon staff, spend countless hours lighting trees, light poles, windows and two Christmas trees along the parade route, within a 14-block radius of the theater’s corner of Market Street in the business district.
City of Poughkeepsie Mayor Nancy Cozean spoke at the final tree lighting in Dongan Park. She marveled at the event’s attendance, and said that each year she is reminded how special it is to be a part of the city.
“God bless you all,” she said.
For some, business as usual
“My business is usually predictable,” said Lou Strippoli, owner of Caffe Aurora and emcee for the evening, when asked if he had seen an increase in business since the festival.
“The celebration is more for the city than individual businesses.”
Strippoli said that his cafe, which normally stays open until 6 p.m. on Friday, extended its hours until 9 p.m. that night.
Strippoli added that what the parade does is draw people into the city. “It opens a door to the city for people not familiar with a certain part of the city,” he said.
Strippoli is also vice president of the River District Association, a coalition of local businesses which worked together with the Bardavon to help organize the event. Businesses such as Amici’s, Caffe Aurora, Milanese, Noah’s Ark, River Station, and Spanky’s make up the River District Association.
Richard LaVacca, owner of Spanky’s Restaurant for the past 24 years, said that the festival gives exposure to his business, which stuck to its usual routine of dinner, drink specials and Friday night karaoke.
“It (the festival) brings people in,” he said, adding that a lot of people get to see businesses for the first time.
“We always do specials, but not particularly specials for that event,” said Aldo Milanese, whose parents own Milanese Restaurant in Poughkeepsie. He said that his family’s business is open until 11 p.m. on Fridays and by that time, the parade is already over.
The tree lighting ended close to 8 p.m.
“I see some of the same people come every year to see the Festival of Lights,” said Milanese.
“Next year’s Festival of Lights will hopefully include an ice-carving competition,” said Strippoli. “This year was a scramble. We moved up things a week earlier, but next year we look to be on schedule.”
Let us introduce ourselves, Dutchess County. “We” are the quasi-famous (at least on the Ulster side of the river), totally fabulous, and always well-dressed ace reporters, Jasmin and Laura. For those who know nothing of our journalistic prowess, we are second only to Brenda Starr and Walter Cronkite in the world of community news-mongering (at least that’s the rumor our grandmas have been spreading at Bingo). If you look past our tendency to indulge in self-referential hubris and saucy wordplay, you’ll find, as does our editor, that we’re reasonably adept observers of the human condition here in Mid-Hudsonia.
But first and foremost, of course, our columns are usually about us, and this one’s no different. Our latest adventure begins with our customary toss-up between going to a coffee house or arriving to an event on time, so, to make a good impression on you, our new target readership, we gave up our minty-mocha lattes and proceeded to the corner of Market and Main.
We arrived at our destination and to our surprise there was a huge crowd gathered in the streets. The people of Pougkeepsie were getting all geared up for a Yuletide Christmas parade! We mingled, putting on our best Poughkeepsie accents to talk to the people and determine just what was going to happen ... the consensus was that everyone was waiting for old Santa Claus. We said we had heard that Mayor Nancy Cozean and her electoral conqueror, Mayor-Elect John Tkazyik, would also be in the parade lineup, but this statement just elicited glazed stares, so we dropped that line of questioning.
Tkazyik and his seasonably dressed blonde lady friend stepped by somewhat early in the parade, between the Amerscot Highland Pipe Band and the classic cars, leading us to wonder even more intensely whether Her Honor would even show her face.
But we were rudely awakened from our reverie when we were both pegged in the head by what we thought was shrapnel, but was in fact Tootsie Rolls, hurled with a little too much irrational exuberance by the man in red himself from the back of a fire truck. Laura unwisely decided to taste Santa’s weapon of choice, the “unsavory candy,” and the look on her face told Jasmin it was fit for neither man nor reindeer. At that point we decided to confront Mr. Claus about his ill manners, lack of motor skills and the fact he should fire the underling who made those stale Tootsie Rolls, but before we could get near him, a swarm of candy-hungry spectators dove after some laffy taffy that the mischievous old elf had just unleashed.
As Santa was whisked away on his chariot, we noticed that his eyes indeed twinkled, and his dimples were merry. His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry. His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow, but under his beard ... a sneer was aglow. Jasmin and Laura cried, “How low!” to which Santa could only reply: ‘Ho, Ho, Ho!”
And that what was the last straw! No one hits Jasmin and Laura in the head with candy! We set off in hot pursuit of Santa, but he seemed to fade into the vaporous evening as the crowds became more viscous than a bowl full of figgy pudding.
Lost now in a meandering throng, we began to panic. No one seemed to know where Santa was, or Ms. Cozean, for that matter. Just when we had given up hope, a man selling glowing holiday gifts pointed the way with his light-saber. In our minds, at least, he bore a striking resemblance to the Ghost of Christmas Past, and even gave us a helpful, suitably spectral tip: “Don’t go too far, or else you’ll end up in the river.”
The road was long and badly paved; and just when we wanted to call it quits, Jasmin saw an ethereal vision of what she thought were guiding stars drawing nearer. But in reality it was Clinton Elementary School’s fourth-grade class, marching with shooting-star decorations that they had made themselves. They could tell that we two travelers were road weary, so they cordially invited us to join them in the trek to the holy tree-lighting site.
Being a fourth-grader again was really awesome; as we walked along with our new classmates we talked about all the things we wanted for Christmas: Tashawn wanted a PlayStation 3; we inquired whether or not he wanted world peace for Christmas as well — he quickly retorted: “No.” but then on second thought he added: “Yeah, and we should have some of that, too!” Clearly he has a future in foreign diplomacy. The fourth-graders grew in our overwrought imaginations into an allegorical symbol for the Ghost of Christmas Present. However, the class soon discovered what non-tech-savvy Luddites we really are and kicked us to the curb.
Slightly disillusioned, we nearly forgot why we had come all this way ... “You’re here for the tree-lighting,” a disembodied voice intoned. We turned around to see what could only at this point be the Ghost of Christmas Future, hovering apparition-like above the throng. We later learned him to be Lou Strippoli, the owner of Caffe Aurora, which is across the street from the park at which we had circuitously arrived; he was emceeing the event, and there, at his side, stood Santa – and Nancy Cozean! “Where is the tree?” we gasped, not at all rhetorically. He said not a word and pointed knowingly to a small, shadowy shape ... Laura in a frightened tone asked: “Is that my future? Is there time to change it?” Strippoli rolled his eyes and seemed to say, “No that is not your future, silly, it’s the chosen tree.”
One fellow pilgrim, more firmly grounded in reality than we, interjected: “What tree? I don’t see no pine tree. I see an oak tree!”
“No,” another man suggested. “The tree in front of the oak tree is a pine tree!”
“That shrubbery?” the lady scoffed.
The unbelievers were soon silenced; it was indeed the chosen tree. Mayor Cozean and Santa, snuggling somewhat inappropriately there on the dais, removed all doubts when they – finally, after much fumbling about and forgettable speechifying during which some in the restless crowd started yelling things like: “Light the tree before I light it myself!” — pressed the magic button and, like a Christmas miracle, the tree was lit, in a beautiful array of red and gold twinkling lights. We could definitely see the tree now. It was no shrub. At that moment, the spirit of Christmas swept over Jasmin and Laura and all the venom of the recent past melted away. The tree’s warm glow and the ensuing cool fireworks display illuminated Santa’s, and Ms. Cozean’s, jolly red noses and cheeks. We realized that Santa was a kindhearted man who had not purposely tried to maim us with candy. We liked the mayor’s hat and oversized gloves.
With joy in our hearts, we decided we loved St. Nick and remembered how much we really love presents! Hopefully, we won’t end up with coal – or even worse: stale Tootsie Rolls — in our stockings this year, despite the fact that we needed a mild spanking and a time-out earlier in the evening.
Jasmin and Laura are truly filled with goodwill toward men – and even some women. And as your ace reporters turned and un-imbedded themselves from the festivities, we remembered the immortal words of Tiny Tim: “God bless us, everyone!”
