Tag Presents

Dear Santa

Michael 2 Comments
Not every year but often enough I’ve shared a letter to Santa here and that overgrown elf didn’t even have the decency even to reply with regrets. Just blew me off. I get it. I’m older than 6 and I asked for impossible things. You know the kind of stuff people ask for when they are putting their Christmas list on line – peace on earth, enough goodwill to choke a horse, and a good take out pizza at a decent price that feeds less than eight.
 
So this year I’m simplifying my requests. I’d still like peace on earth and goodwill to all people regardless of gender identification, but let’s scale back some of the top tier requests. For instance, Dear Santa, please bring me…
 
A phone book. Seriously, have you ever successfully looked up a phone number from the Internet. And forget about finding an address. I’m sure both are no problem if you’re willing to spend enough dollars. Oh yes, there are sites out there that claims to be free and indeed you can search for free. You just can’t find for free. But those of us old enough to remember phone books remember those days of being able to look up a name even if we couldn’t spell it absolutely correctly and find an address and phone number. That’s the sort of thing that is particularly handy when you are writing out Christmas cards and can’t make out if that’s 333, 338, 388, or 888 Easy St. and swear you’ll re-write clearer when you update your old fashioned address book for next year.
 
Easy open everything. I don’t mean just aspirin bottles. On everything. Everything! Seriously, whether it’s a flash drive, a chef’s knife, or a 10 foot retractable steel rule, it comes sandwiched between two pieces of plastic that are fused together and there is no “open here” corner. The only way in is to hack your way through the plastic vault with a machete or fire axe. That’s assuming you have a machete or fire axe that is not still sealed in its own packaging. And Santa, while you’re at it, how about those aspirin bottles too.
 
Television theme songs.  Because I miss them. You might think this is a silly request but if Santa was able to come up with pet rocks, Tamagotchi, and Tickle Me Elmo … well, silly is as silly does.
 
So that’s my list for this year Santa. There’s not much so I expect to get something this year. And while you’re at it, how about that reasonably priced pizza for one. Two large with 3 toppings for $5.95 is a great deal but come on, there’s just me here.
 
Thank you and Merry Christmas 
DearSanta

The Last Minute – A Special Piece of Real Reality

Michael Leave a comment

Regular readers know that Real Reality strikes on Mondays and Thursdays.  If you didn’t know that it doesn’t make you irregular.  You just have to read more often.  And/or more regularly.  Anyway, for this to show up on a Wednesday you know it must be something special.  Well, tomorrow is something special so that could make today special too.  It certainly makes today down to the wire.  (No race track analogies in 2015.  Three in a row are plenty for any couple of years!)

Regular readers also know that in Realityville, Christmas Eve is not a shopping day.  Christmas Eve has enough of its own tasks and charges.  You have had plenty of shopping days going back to Black Friday Eve (aka Thanksgiving).  Ask any major retailer.  If you’re not done by now you are on your own.  But don’t bother asking any major retailer.  They lie.

Back to Christmas Eve.  Don’t you have more Christmassy things to do today than shopping anyway?

There are Christmas Eve dinners to attend to.  Is the most recognizable Christmas Eve dinner the Feast of the Seven Fishes?  Perhaps so.  An Italian tradition on a day that Italian Catholics abstain from meat, this vigil meal will be served in many households.  In Eastern Europe, many cultures add a couple more meatless dishes to their Christmas Eve dinner to make nine or eleven choices.  Russians prepare twelve selections of fish and grains.  In Germany and Austria, Christmas Eve may be spent preparing carp, potatoes, and salads for dinner after sundown.

You’re not a big eater you say?  Then you’ll probably spend today wrapping all the presents you carefully selected and bought with plenty of time to get under the tree before Christmas.  Did you know that, television families with piles of beautifully wrapped presents under their trees weeks before the big day excepted, most holiday wrapping happens on Christmas Eve.  Much of the gifts planned for destinations outside the home if not wrapped sometime on Christmas Eve, usually during cooking breaks, are wrapped the day before and sometimes the day of the planned giving.

If you happen to be reading this in Sweden you aren’t wrapping your gifts today.  You’ll be unwrapping them since the day you exchange Christmas presents is today!  That would be in Sweden and many other countries where the wrapping happened yesterday in anticipation of exchanging them on Christmas Eve.

In Australia where it’s nice and warm today, many people will be out caroling this evening.  While singing they will light candles together hoping for a clear night that their light can join the stars.

And if your wrapping and cooking and eating and singing all get done early and you are still looking for something to do besides more shopping, today would be a good day to thank God for getting us all through another year.

Merry Christmas.

Now that’s what we think. Really. How ‘bout you.

 

Happy Boxing Day?

Michael Leave a comment

Happy Boxing Day!

That may be the first time we’ve ever verbalized that sentiment.  The last time we even mentioned Boxing Day was in a post from two years back (On the Second Day of Christmas, Dec. 26, 2011, in Life).  There was no “Happy” with it because it wasn’t a salutation.  It was just a mention.

Just a mention is about as much thought as Boxing Day gets in the U.S.  Other than being a cousin to St. Stephen’s Day, what is Boxing Day?  If you’re one of our regular readers from Canada, England, or Belize you can probably skip ahead a paragraph.  Or not.  That way you tell us how far afield we are.

To us it seems to be a fine example of the Christmas spirit.  Apparently it started out as the rich and powerful, landowners, gentry, or what have you in whatever country you are, planned their Christmas feasts.  They found themselves in need of those to serve said feast along with answering the doors, passing the appetizers, mixing the drinks, preparing accommodations for overnight guests, and other things that would go along with a proper celebration.  Since those doing the serving were thus tied up on Christmas Day, the well to do would give them the following day off to be with their families, often sending them home with boxes of gifts and perhaps even leftovers.  Thus, Boxing Day.

Today, if you were to ask someone in America about this tradition you might get answers like “They got paid for working the holiday, didn’t they?” But that’s just why it’s such a great Christmas story.  Of course they received whatever recompense they would for serving their employers and their employers’ guests.  But in a time when money meant more then than now they also knew that their real pay came in the gratitude of those they served.  The boxes of presents were more tips than payment, more appreciation than obligation, more friendship between those who ask and those who do than charity between those who have and those who don’t.

Boxing Day may be a tradition America could learn from.  We may live in a time and place that great household holiday festivals aren’t the norm even for the very rich.  But there are plenty of people who give up their holiday to serve.  Fireman, police, paramedics, and hospital workers are the essential servants in our time and place.  When their shifts are over on Christmas or any other holiday, they may take home boxes of presents but they do take home our gratitude for being there for us every day.

Now, that’s what we think.  Really.  How ‘bout you?