Season’s Greetings
Written on November 5, 2010 by
May you live every day of your life. -Jonathan Swift
The holidays are just about upon us. The hustle and bustle of people trying to fit their everyday lives in with the additional holiday shopping and wrapping; cooking and partying; and the house guest or the entertaining at your place.
It is a time of year where traffic anywhere near an outlet or mall is backed up, bumper to bumper for an extended evening rush ‘hour‘ and all day on the weekends. This is when people are just so courteous. They do not let you cut into traffic, cause that would mean one extra bumper ahead of them. People in traffic often exchange colorful words of description of the other driver, not to mention the sign language that often goes along with it. Believe me it is not Happy Holidays being mouthed to you, it’s more like Merry &*#? Christmas and just think of that hand gesture as Santa waving to you, spreading some more good cheer.
Many retail stores just add to this strain. What a sale! Too bad they left out the part where they only have 3 laptops on sale for $189.00, that is 50% off the original price; next thing you know there are 200 buyers sitting outside the store before it even opens. Talk about a rough crowd when they find this out. I love clothing stores with a great price on some fancy sweaters; before they open, the table is well stocked with these ever so neatly folded delicate knits; it takes one woman 2.2 minutes and a crowd all of 30 seconds to destroy it. Never intrude upon the space a seriously shopping woman whose mission is to get the best buy, if not the greatest gift at the most cheapest price there is; cause if you do you are just asking for a heaping mouthful of trouble.
Of course it is easier to shop, compared to wrapping all those presents. Wrapping those first three presents are like you have never done this before. Too many choices of paper, the tape and the scissors are just not in the right place when you need them, the ribbon just doesn’t stop sliding and won’t curl correctly, the bows don’t stick and you have the tags but forgot the pen. Did I remember to take that price tag off that gift I just wrapped? I must have, right? Crap, I can’t remember!
So many of us have an office party or a gathering to go to, celebrate the holiday cheer. If everyone brings a little something to eat we can just have a bit of food to go with all that alcohol consumption. Like most nights it is hard enough to make dinner that is not from a can or frozen (just pop it in the microwave and in 2 minutes you can have an elegant lean cuisine main course). There is always Shepard’s Pie. A large Kentucky Fried Chicken mashed potatoes and gravy, a large pie tin to put a mash potato pie bottom in, everything in the fridge left over diced mixed with gravy, top pie with more mashed potatoes and slow bake until the center is hot and the top slightly browned. Not to worry, nobody is at the celebration to eat– It’s party time!
If you are the lucky one entertaining this year then there is just a whole other list of things to do. Time to get out the good china – do we even have good china? How about silverware, have enough for everyone or are we sharing knives? Glasses? Is there enough room for everyone? Then, there is the food to think about. What are we making not everything can go in the oven at once, and there is only one oven, right? Ah, we have a microwave and toaster oven to help us. Who doesn’t eat what, does this look like a restaurant? Why can’t everybody drink the same thing? If you are Italian, just stop what you are doing now and start cooking, you are already behind -it is like an all day eating orgy at our holiday dinners, you’ll never be ready!
Before you know it someone is traveling a distance for the holiday festivities, and you have a house guest. Just when you thought you were organized and had it under control, someone will be at your place, someone else to consider, someone who will take up time and space, someone on a mini vacation ready to be entertained and waited on. Keep smiling, it becomes you.
But the truth of the matter is, without this hustle and bustle, rushing around, being stuck in traffic, last minute crap, cooking, cleaning, partying, entertaining, wrapping and unwrapping, what would the holidays be. The same o’ same o’ each year. No joys, accomplishments, giggles and smiles and memories to add to our already unorganized photo albums and boxes of pictures -that tells the story of our life.
Happy Holidays to all and Happy 70th Birthday, to my finally retiring father, with love always!