Around the holidays, immense stress is placed on the host, who feels the need to clean the house until it shines. Everything must look perfect, and the entire family is scrambling for last minute preparations, so that the guests will be able to appreciate the beauty of the house. This relates to the ideas of humanism that were prevalent in Italy during the Renaissance. Humanism is the idea of appreciating the beauty of the world for what it is, and leaving it more beautiful than it was found. The concept of “remodeling” something to make an older object look even more updated and visually pleasing, was a big component of humanism during the Renaissance. For instance, artists such as Leonardo da Vinci spent much of their time figuring out how
