Saturday night

It dawned on me this morning while taking a shower at my Mom's that it is three weeks until Christmas.  The shower and the dawning are not connected in any way but I must say that it is a really terrible shower.  It is like the showers in cheap European hotels:  instead of water flowing out of the showerhead, it sort of drips quickly and in three or four streams of drips.  It takes about 3 minutes just to get your hair wet and another 7 minutes to rinse the shampoo out of your hair.  By the time you have finished washing your hair (10 minutes) you are lucky if the water has even gotten your feet wet.  Needless to say it is a frustrating experience and every time I get in that shower I wonder why I just didn't go dirty for the day. 

But I digress.  Back to Christmas.  Three weeks until we celebrate the birth of Santa Claus.  I was never a very good shopper but when my kids were little it was easy.  Go to Toys 'R Us and buy things and that was it.  When they were teenagers it was all about gift certificates.  Now I am on the dole and I have made the statement that there will be no gifts from me this year.  Everyone agrees, everyone (aka my kids) acknowledges that we are all over burdened with "stuff" and need nothing else.  So, ostensibly, we all agreed to not get gifts.

But you know it isn't going to go that route.  You know, I know, they know that come present-opening time there must be something to open.  Some box, bottle, or bag to gleefully rip apart and admire the contents.  So it leads me to the dilemma:  should I adhere to the "No Gifts" rule or should I do as I am sure my kids will do:  buy something.  Some little thing, something under $5.00, some item that will make the recipient smile or laugh or groan. 

And that's OK.  While we all have way too much stuff and we definitely do not need more, we also need the tradition of giving gifts.  We need to recognize the holiday in the accepted holiday manner, and giving gifts (along with drinking champagne) is in that holiday manner.  What those gifts will be remains the mystery and it might remain that way for another two and a half weeks.  But as much as we talk the talk, we will probably not be walking the "gift-free" walk come gift time.  Something small (diamonds are small, right?) and something cheap (OK, no diamonds) wrapped tastefully.  I think that's the ticket this year.  And any money left over goes to one's favorite charity.  Let people with too little stuff benefit from our overload.

But I still remember those pilgrimages to Toys 'R Us fondly, getting a babysitter, wandering the toy aisles, laughing at some of the options, excited at others.  We probably spent too much money but the payback was Christmas morning, watching the kids open the packages.  Too bad a new box of Legos no longer does the trick.  sigh.