It probably won't come as a big surprise to my handful of readers that I don't do much in the way of Christmas shopping. Something about the whole concept has troubled me for decades, certainly the way it manifests in modern America. I suppose if one is uncomfortable with notions like profit, ownership, and accumulation of superficial things, and if one has very little money, the season becomes increasingly awkward, peculiar, even traumatizing. It's like watching some kind of bizarre movie through pane glass that you are on the other side of. But at least until recently, the whole "thing" wouldn't start until after Thanksgiving. As I'm sure you've all noticed, it started the day after Halloween this year. The explanation I heard in passing on television news was that retailers were so concerned by the fewer days between Thanksgiving and Christmas in 2019, that they had to expand the season. I mean, it is surely obvious that this has little or nothing to do with celebrating the birth of Christ and everything to do with retail profit.
I guess I wouldn't mind so much if we re-named the holiday, and just called it "Present Day" or "Yearly Celebration of Stuff." And I'm a non-traditional enough of a Christian, indeed post-Christian, enough, that it might seem like I would simply ignore the religious roots of the holiday. But I care. I care enough about the life and values of the holy man called Jesus and the religion I grew up with and whose music is at the core of my being, that I just cannot square these two polar opposites: the frenzied rush to spend enormous amounts of money on technology, household goods, clothes and plastic-packaged toys, and a mystic who, during his ministry at least, appears to have had no home, probably just one robe and one pair of sandals. If he manifested in our midst tomorrow, what would he make of this whole phenomenon? I can guess, but it's not a question I can definitively answer.
In December, I will probably do what I have done other years, which is buy one or two locally- or hand-made presents for my dearest friends, wrap them carefully, and send or give them in person. I will probably send out about a dozen Christmas cards, the old fashioned kind. And I will probably make some cookies or holiday food for a few other friends -- and that's it. By some people's standards, my life is pretty sad. I don't have any young children in my life, and no family that I am close with anymore. Many people may be going through the motions for their family's or tradition's sake, but I cannot and will not do it. And on Christmas Day itself, I am likely to listen to some music from England, or sit in silence, watching what is sure to be a very snowy, wintry scene outside. (If I had my own home, I would invite people for a meal, but I do not.) It is not about rebellion, it is about aligning with my perception of the spirit of the season. Under this kind of social and retail pressure, all we can do is make our own choices.
