The Public Side of Christmas

Here I sit at the desk with my computer - yes, I have recently taken to sitting in more appropriate places to do my typing (one too many neck cricks) - with the Christmas music on and the glow of the tree lighting my notes. That's right, the Christmas tree. When I got home from work all the people in my house were awake and somewhat conscious so I insisted that it be done right away. It actually took two more hours to be enacted. Jacob was asleep by then so Zach and I reasoned that it would be a nice surprise for him in the morning. We're crossing our fingers that he's not pissed he missed out on helping to move the tree into the house. I'm actually pretty confident that he'll just be happy his parents finally came through for him. We;re just doing lights now and Jacob can help decorate tomorrow. We had a box of lights from my mom's so there were lots of colors to choose from. We went with 'gold' (orange) - not sure why. It was the color that I always thought was so ugly on the tree when I was growing up, but tonight it just felt right. OK, I just took a picture from my phone. Soon I will get a digital camera and I won't have to choose between quality or instant gratification.

Oh, so last week I got my glasses re-fixed. I stopped in at a jewelry repair shop on a whim. 20 minutes and $12 later I walked out with my repaired glasses. Remember the nose piece fell off the same night they were stepped on, then later formed back into shape at the glasses place? So that same place told me I would need new frames (also meaning new lenses since they no longer make the frames I have) when I went back a couple days after the first repair job. I waited til my next appointment for contacts to see what those guys said. They agreed they could be repaired but said the soddering would be $56. But then the nice old Russian man at the jewelry shop came through for only $12. Woohoo!

Back to Christmas: All kinds of people come out of the woodwork when it's the hoiday season. Generally I prefer kind people like the man at Dunkin Donuts a couple weeks ago who told me to really appreciate Jacob when he's young. He talked about his grown sons and said nice things about me and Jakie. I live for instances like this, when you get to connect with other people on a genuine level even though you are strangers to each other. Sometimes I just get really annoyed though, like the trip to the mall I wrote about with Zach and Jacob a week and a half ago. I came around the corner where they were waiting for me and a really annoying sales lady was talking away at Jacob. I shouldn't have been so rude, but this lady did NOT know when to go away. She was going on and on to Jacob about Santa and all things related. I totally cut her off after a minute and just blurted out that Jacob doesn't know who Santa is or something dumb like that. She stopped mid-sentence and walked away. Zach was pissed at me for acting like that because I think at that point I hadn't worn him down yet about the Santa thing. Even though I had totally saved him from the over-zealous mall employee (who he hated possibly more than me), his defenses were up and the Santa comment hit home. But seriously, it really, really pisses me off that people see a kid at Christmas and start going off about Santa. What if we were Jewish - or celebrate one of the many other holidays associated with this time of year? I almost wish I was Jewish so I could go around spouting this to people from my high horse.

Here's what I'm hoping we come to agree on: Santa exists, but he's not sneaking in at night to bring us gifts. He can embody whatever kind of Christmas virtue, but his presence in our lives will not be associated with presents. I want there to be some kind of magic for Jacob, and I want that magic to involve the goodness of the human spirit, not goods from the toy store. Everytime we approach the annoying jingle of the Salvation Army collection bucket I hand Jacob some change and prep him on what to do. The other day we donated money to the Make-A-Wish foundation and got to take our paper angel home. I always talk to Jacob about what we're doing and why. I try to impress upon him how lucky we are to be living the life we have so that he won't take it for granted. I generally try to live my life embodying the Christmas spirit every day. I don't think we need to have a season for giving, it should take place each moment of our lives.

I think it is kind of ironic that in this 'season of joy' I witness more road rage than any other time of year. Yesterday I was rounding a corner after stopping at the red light when I saw two cars pull over and middle-age men jump out of them, the one in front immediatly shouting at the other guy, "What the hell are you doing *bleep bleep*! You're supposed to stop at a red light, you *bleep bleep*" Seriously, was this necessary? Could he maybe have given the guy in back half a second to say sorry or something, to explain himself before jumping down his throat? Maybe the poor guy was having a seizure or heart attack or something and lost control on his pedals.

Last year in the post office parking lot I pulled into a spot and started to get Jacob out of the car when this lady approached me and started screaming obscenities into my face. Apparently I 'took her parking spot', but I don't know how. I believe she had been in front of me, her car sitting off to the side. I remember noticing her car before I pulled into the spot but it looked like she was pulling out of the lot because she was at least 4 cars lengths ahead and it is a ONE-WAY parking lot, so how was she going to get into that spot even if I wasn't there?

There I was standing in the cold with a two year-old in my arms and this freak is dropping the f-bomb every-other word because she had to park 15 feet further away. Then she stormed away without even giving me a chance to respond. Are you freaking kidding me? What the hell kind of a person does this? I lasted til she was out of ear shot and then burst into tears because I just cannot take that kind of hatred from people. Hehe, I remember I had on my infamous hat which somewhat shielded my tears (I was not going to give her the satisfaction of leaving) so I went about business as usual and got my post office stuff taken care of. The lady had to finish parking before going inside so she had to wait in line behind me for 10 minutes. I don't know how she could have not felt too ashamed to show her face in there. When I was done at the counter I turned around and spoke my little speech (kill them with kindness my mom would advise) that I'd been rehearsing the whole time in line. She couldn't get away then, and there was a whole line of people who got to hear what an ass she was. I said something like, "I hope whatever it is that put you in such a bad mood that you had to harass a mother with a small child, doesn't ruin your holiday." Then I went out to my car and cried my way home and then cried more. I am just so sensitive like that. I can't let things roll off my back.

At the very least these experiences make for good stories. For instance, the lady at Target the other day who was talking loudly on her cell phone. I really, really hate when people talk on their cell phones in public like that. If it is quietly, or you have no other choice, and it's only going to be for a minute, ok. But if you are just carrying on a conversation, going about your shopping business, come on. I've always wished I could work up enough courage to start taking part in the conversations...you know how you read about people chiming in with little comments about someone else's phone conversation to get their message across. Well when this lady got off the phone she was not happy, and I happened to be the closest person standing near her. She came right up to me and started whining about how her daughter's husband just left her, I mean she was intending to tell me the whole story. I'm still not sure if she had mistakenly taken me for someone she knows. I wanted to tell her that if her daughter is anything like her then I don't blame the husband one bit.

Also in Target was the line to use the picture maker. There's two of them, but only one scans photographs. They both work off of cd's. There was a guy using the one that scans pictures, but he had a cd. I waited behind him for 30 minutes, with another guy waiting behind me because he had to scan a picture too. The other picture maker was empty. This guy doing his pictures even turned around to me at one point and asked if I couldn't just use the other printer. I told him no and why. He stayed at his picture maker. He must have done about 20 pictures and actually asked me to help him with something he was doing. I finally asked him how many more he had to do (my polite way of suggesting that maybe he move to the other printer). I had a very small window of opportunity in which I was child-free and I wasted it in line. They need to enact a time limit when there are other people waiting, or start scheduling appointments for use. I left after 30 minutes, but decided that today would be different. I walked into the store with two bags - one for activities and one containing Jacob's lunch - and arrived at a line-less photo center. Go figure. I did my stuff and exited five minutes later with both my bags and no purchases. I probably looked like a shoplifter, or crazy, or both.

So these are the things that come to mind when I think of the holiday season: A jaded mix of crowds, annoyances, small gifts of charity, brotherly hatred, kindness in surprising places, irony, and a tiny, funny-looking tree with the potential of the world balled up in its confined roots.