New Haven Independent

Their mom therefore pronounced the 2009 holiday season one of the best ever, even though she’s still looking for work.

Spirits were indeed high along with the unseasonable temperatures Thursday afternoon as the Dawson family joined an estimated 3,000 to 5,000 others for the city’s festive tree-lighting ceremonies on the Green.

As they greeted a celebratory season, families interviewed at the event also had the recession and economic insecurity on their minds. That was true for those without jobs as well as those families who still have them.

After her landlord sold the building in which she resided on Hallock Street a year ago, Tiffany Dawson (who did not want to be photographed) fought to stay. She was unsuccessful. After she spent four months in a shelter, New Haven Home Recovery found her family an apartment. It is providing rent support for the first six months.

“It’s a new program, and I’m one of the lucky ones to be selected,” said Dawson, whose work is in the nursing field. “Now I’ll take any job,” she said as her kids got their turn on one of the evening’s perennial favorite rides, The Alpine Safari.

As the kids mounted the charming mechanical creatures, Serenity said she’s hoping for a computer, a bike, and a real animal to play with.

Her mom listened to the enumeration stoically and without comment. Still on the one-to- ten scale, she pronounced this holiday a ten “because I’m in a better situation.”

Waiting behind the Dawsons for Mr. Polar Bear were stay-at-home mom Maureen Lavan and her three-and-half year old son Jake from the Morris Cove neighborhood.

Unlke Dawson, Lavan hasn’t had to worry about having a home at Christmas. Lavan’s husband has a secure academic job. Still, this season, she said, she and her husband will focus more on their child and reduce the gifts she and her husband exchange. “You never know what’s going to happen,” she said.

Last Christmas Fair Haven couple Juan and Miriam Gutierrez got the best present ever, their daughter Meredith. As the smiling 1 year-old nibbled on a hunk of cheddar and waited for the 65-foot Norway spruce to be lit up, however, her daddy made a confession: Even though he is gainfully employed as a cook downtown, he was going to keep his family small, for now.

“I’m young. I’m 30. I’ll wait [to have more children]. The economy is not great.”

As they queued for their turn in the Santa house, they said they will give Meredith an Elmo toy, because she likes that creature. As to presents to others, Miriam Gutierrez added, “I’m giving less, no money.”

A similar tale was told farther down the long serpentine line to the Santa house at the edge of the lower Green. There Imani Campbell and her mom Cassiene Edwards were hoping to get in to see the jelly-bellied one before he flew off.

In September of 2008, Edwards said, she was laid off from managing a Kentucky Fried Chicken in Bridgeport. Now she’s working part-time at H & R Block while looking for something more stable.

Does she tell Imani that she’s out of work and she can’t have all the toys she wants? Absolutely. “She goes through the catalogs pointing,” said Edwards.

The 4-year-old is likely going to have a pretty good haul nevertheless, with a four-wheel-drive she’s asking for and a Nintendo DS.

“I’m sad, but you have to make the best of it. We’re still going to have a good Christmas because it’s [really] about being with family and laughter and memories,” said her mom.

Even this year’s tree donators Sarah and Fred Peters of Shelton admitted to a frisson of economic fear beneath the cheer. As bubbles floated across the Green and the choirs of the Betsy Ross Magnet School and Fair Haven K-8 sang carols, Fred Peters noted that he and his coworkers at Sikorsky took three unpaid paid furlough days this year to save the jobs of others.

“Look at Pratt & Whitney. There’s always a possibility of losing your job in this market.”

The Peters’ job this night was secure. As the donors of the spruce, they, along with the mayor, threw the ceremonial switch and the tree’s 35,000 bulbs flashed on.

It didn’t disappoint Sheila Hutchings. After taking in the dazzle, she said she wanted a bubble-shooting gun for the holiday.

Her dad Stuart is the proprietor of the Bubble and Squeak self-serve laundromat at Park and George Streets. So he knows about bubbles.

He also knows about economics. “Business in general is slower. Everyone who’s got a business knows it’s tighter,” he said.

And the bubble gun for Sheila? “Should not be a problem.”