‘Tis the season of togetherness. Leaning back from the Thanksgiving feast, loosening belts, we literally move closer to each other thanks to our expanding waistlines. While it may be family and friends we keep closest through the holidays, this is also the time of year when the community closes ranks by instinct and habit. When the influence of the sun flickers down toward the solstice, our automatic response to darkness is to gather together, whether it is at home, in church, or even down at the corner bar. Out of these close associations grow traditions from the joke fruitcake passed back and forth among friends to the massing of thousands of carolers in the Ram Pasture to light the town tree. It is these associations, these traditions, that remind us that despite all the dark-induced doubts we may have about just about everything this time of year, Newtown is a pretty good place to call home.

Of course, most towns seem like great places, when measured on the subjective scale of seasonal sentiment, weighed down as it is by the satisfactions of Thanksgiving. But Newtown truly has reason to be proud. Somehow, it has grown to maturity with its historical Main Street intact and its rural character holding on tenaciously to scenic ridges, river banks, and, incredibly, open farmland. It has an impressive new municipal center in the middle of an even more impressive tract of public property at Fairfield Hills. It has a brand-new administration and council, a revitalized political process, and an engaged electorate. It has a system of schooling, both public and private, including the recently honored “blue ribbon” school at St Rose, that continues to draw families and dedicated educators to this town over all others.

These big achievements are not individual accomplishments, though there are plenty of individual standouts in every great community enterprise. These are things we have accomplished together. And it is just this mutual coherence that enables us to clear perhaps the highest hurdle to community excellence: care and attention to the nearly hidden needs of a town’s least advantaged citizens, who struggle daily with isolation, illness, or the unrelenting cruelties of poverty. This town has mobilized through its food pantries, its civic organizations, and the incomparable free medical clinic Kevin’s Community Center to make a sustained and conscientious effort to ensure that, as Newtown moves forward, no one is left behind.

As much as we can do collectively as a community of 27,000, let us all remember that the great benefit that comes of being together is available to everyone who reaches out to just one other person. Whether it is the widow(er) next door, the beleaguered sales clerk on the other side of the cash register, or the bored adolescent behind the closed bedroom door, there are people everywhere who could benefit from a few moments of togetherness — not just in this season, but every day. For too many people, darkness is not just a seasonal thing. Everyone needs the bright spark of relationship.