When my first child was young, her mother and I were in agreement about Christmas-time gift-giving for her. We got her things that were fun, things that were practical and things that she needed for her health and well-being. We made no effort to bury the Christmas tree in packages. When the first child came to live with the members of my second family — Bride Two and her brother and sister — she was astonished to see the mounds of packages that her siblings received. She turned to me on Christmas morning in 1991, and whispered in wonder, “Dad,” as her three-year-old sister tore into boxes and bags and the wrappings buried her two-year-old brother.
As was often the case in the Fifties, we who were poor were unaware that we were, and at Christmas, my brother and sister and I were pleased with the gifts that we got. I have a picture of the three of us at Christmas time. My sister is seated in a small chair and is flanked by her two big brothers; I am standing at her left. My sister is smiling, wearing a fluffy holiday dress; my brother and I are also smiling, and dressed alike, in horizontally striped sweaters and double gun belts with toy guns. I estimate our ages in the photo at three (my sister), four (my brother) and five. We look happy, satisfied with the gifts we had been given. Years later, after abuse had bloomed in my father’s alcoholism, I lay fearfully in the bed of our one-room apartment on Christmas Eve, listening to my mother telling my father about the roach in the caboose of the train set my brother and I were to get from Santa in the morning. I huddled under the covers, listening to my father trying to blow the roach from the train. My Christmas morning surprise was carefully orchestrated, my awareness of the identity of “Santa Claus” a secret from my siblings.
I loved that train, the only gift I remember from that year, but I did not embrace excess as a counterpoint to the little that I’d received as a child. For one thing, I did not see a contrast in my neighborhood or on the very little bit of TV we were able to see, so I had nothing with which to make a comparison. When I married, and we had a child, we gave that child gifts, but as I indicated above, those gifts were not so many that she could not enjoy and appreciate what she had. We did the same for each other. When I was the manager of a small loan lending office in Southern Indiana, the big lending period was shortly after the new year had begun. On many applications, on the line where one was asked the purpose of the loan, the answer was often, “pay Christmas bills.” We never had that problem: We did not overspend. But now, comes the time.
Recent news reports have noted that online spending records were broken by the housebound pandemic populace in this past period of consumer opportunity, commonly known as Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, which retailers started in late October, presumably because they knew that shoppers would be unable or unwilling to pack pandemic-stricken stores. But I say to you: “C’mon, people. Jeff’s got enough. Go see Adam, and Barry and Andréa and Aaron. They live here. Go to the Bonna Shops, and walk across the street to see Nate. Call Paula, Ethel or Judy.” When you can, spend where you live. Now is the time.
cjon3acd@att.net