Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Peace on Earth?

With the holiday season under full sway, I can't help opining that for most of us modern women, preparations can be so hectic the actual day isn't much fun! After all, how can you appreciate the the joyfully greedy sound of ripping paper when you're the one who so carefully taped the paper on in the first place?!My first Christmas as a new wife I groused about the fact that were it not for me, my inlaws might not have had a present under their tree. (They would have had something eventually...) It takes a certain kind of awareness to buy something when it's on sale, wrap it, label it and get it in the mail in time to arrive by a CERTAIN day. (Same goes for Birthdays, Weddings and Anniversaries.) I just hadn't realized that when my mother gave me a book of stamps and a calendar with all our family members' birthdays written down, that it was actually an initiation--perhaps a greater milestone to "becoming a woman" than purchasing my first lipstick. The first three years of my marriage I yelled and nagged. Then I realized that if I were single, I would be the one leaning over the eaves on a rickety ladder with a staple gun and a string of lights. So now I confine myself to obsessing about having enough cookies and in enough variety to make a "pretty" cookie plate on Christmas Eve, and whether I have to give all of my daughter's teachers equal gifts even if I think one or another has chosen the wrong profession and would be better off stuffing envelopes in a back room where they didn't have to talk to actual people. (Or maybe it's just that they need to talk only to people over the age of 30?) I've learned to make lists and start early and not to promise or expect to accomplish much else during the month of November. (If it ain't in by November 1st, don't expect it until the New Year.)

This year, Christmas came a bit early. We celebrated mom/dad/daughter Christmas on the 12th of December so we don't have to lug our gifts to the inlaws on the 24th. Less to carry and lose and whine about later. So what am I going to do for the next 2 weeks? I don't know. I truly don't know. With nothing much to complain about, I'll have to find other ways to amuse myself. Like napping. Or bathing. Or handing out unsolicited advice in this blog. Here's my gem for today:

Merry Christmas--don't MARRY Christmas, and you'll have a much happier New Year.