Right now I am kicking myself for procrastinating way too much on Christmas presents. I go through this process every year: I set high expectations, I lack in organizing a way to meet my own expectations, I procrastinate, I begin to dread Christmas, I get depressed, I drink a lot of coffee and maybe some wine (today), I get myself together and mail my cards and presents late. I am stuck between punishing myself for my own procrastination and cherishing these precious days previous to Christmas and while my children are ages 4 and 6. I fully expect to weep quietly to myself when they turn 5 and 7 this spring.
I get up at 4 am today to get my pictures together (pictures are always our presents to friends and family). Not only do I start way too late in the game, but I seem to be terribly inefficient once I do start. I sat in front of the computer for about 5 hours this morning…with not much to report. I promised myself as soon as I got home in the afternoon I would finish the job of weeding through a year’s worth of pictures for our calendar-gifts. Deep down I knew something would inevitably steer me off track.
After dinner Sam (my 4 year old) wants to make chocolate covered pretzels. “Okay, we’ll make them.” I say sweetly. How can I deny him? Sweets are his love language.
Not too long after that, I look up and see a purple hat atop an aging face outside my kitchen door. I inhale in a short moment of alarm as the wrinkled face with a half open jaw peers through the window. “Oh, Judy” I say to myself.
She is an elderly lady in my neighborhood. I began as her Shaklee girl, helping her order her vitamins and non-toxic cleaners. That began about a year and a half ago, and now she regularly stops by, calls, and asks me to stop by her house to pick her up sometimes. I take her to the bank, CVS when she’s sick, whatever she needs. She lives alone; she’s 74. She tells me about her problems—how she thinks her hair “looks like shit”; how her friends think they’re too good for her; how her son-in-law doesn’t like her. She walks slow for 74 and many times I think she seems much older than she is. Someone who drops in on her occasionally found her passed out in her bedroom a few weeks ago; her blood sugar had dropped too low.
I took her to church last week and she wants to go again. I ask her what’s wrong with her normal church. She says the people who live across the street from her went to the same church and never offered to take her. One day they even passed her on their way—she was walking, they were driving—and didn’t offer to stop. She said she thought that was very un-Christian of them.
I can’t make my mind up about Judy, but I help her out anyway and sometimes I think she has a point. I am sure the couple that drove by her on the way to church that day had the same feeling I did when she showed up on my porch tonight. She had been downtown and needed a ride home. I was reluctant at first, only because I was dishing dinner up, preparing chocolate for the pretzels and in the midst of chastising myself for all my Christmas procrastination.
But when I left her at her house tonight, she hugged me and said, “You’re my favorite person right now.” Although her words seemed too generous, I was glad that she said them…glad that my small efforts bring her a bit of company I suppose.
Besides, I have no excuse not to help. I’m a professional procrastinator and my Christmas cards and gifts are always late. And now, I sit and write this instead of finishing my picture project…with sticky chocolate fingers…
Monday, December 19, 2011
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Oh Santa...
“Christmas is only 11 days away Mom,” my 6 year old eagerly says to me this morning. I raise my eyebrows to show interest, while swallowing hard my bubble of guilt and procrastination. Things are right on track for me this year--I am behind on practically every gift and card I have set out to either buy or make. But this year I am also feeling the weight of Santa on my shoulders. Oh Santa....
This year I am gently attempting to blow the Santa myth out of the water.
Last year I tried as well, but I was unsuccessful. About a month in advance of Christmas, I broke the news to my then 5 year old daughter that there was no Santa, only God. I explained that Jesus gave us the real gift by conquering death and giving us a free ticket to eternal bliss. But that didn’t stack up to the wonder of Santa Claus. In fact, after our “talk” she set out to prove me wrong. Upon loading my bagged groceries into my shopping cart one afternoon, the clerk asked her: “Are you all ready for Santa Claus?” My daughter exclaimed, “My Mommy says there is no Santa! But there is a Santa. I know because I saw him sitting in a chair at the fire station.” How could I argue with her? She had publically exposed my parental cruelty and I was looked upon by the clerk in utter confusion.
Later that day I asked my daughter, “Addi, do you really want there to be a Santa Claus?” Her answer was an emphatic “Yes!” “Well fine,” I said, “then there is a Santa.”
Two weeks later Santa brought her a guinea pig. And every time I tell someone her bunk beds are from Ikea, she reminds me, “No Mom, Santa brought them to me.”
Why do I want to blow the Santa myth? Well because it’s worthless, that’s why. I desire only to give my children what is real and true and everlasting. But society thinks otherwise and I find myself challenged again this year.
This year I decided not to come right out and deny Santa's existence, but to ever-so-gently point out the flaws in the Santa theory. I read her the original story of Saint Nicholas…the one about the old man from the Netherlands who dropped gold down the chimney into the poor girls’ stockings. “After he died—oh well, I’ll be, look at that he’s dead—they named him St. Nicholas” I read.
We also didn’t make it to sit on Santa’s lap, but we did visit his reindeer.
I am a harsh cruel Mommy, I know. But I love her too much to build her up on lies, and the truth is this world is a harsh place where children go cold and hungry on Christmas. And those children who are so greatly suffering under the curse of the world are the ones who just may believe that Jesus brings a greater gift than Santa Claus.
One day Addi will see it this way, I pray. But as of today, I stand upon the shaky ground of neither building up nor tearing down her dreams. We’ll see what happens come Christmas….
This year I am gently attempting to blow the Santa myth out of the water.
Last year I tried as well, but I was unsuccessful. About a month in advance of Christmas, I broke the news to my then 5 year old daughter that there was no Santa, only God. I explained that Jesus gave us the real gift by conquering death and giving us a free ticket to eternal bliss. But that didn’t stack up to the wonder of Santa Claus. In fact, after our “talk” she set out to prove me wrong. Upon loading my bagged groceries into my shopping cart one afternoon, the clerk asked her: “Are you all ready for Santa Claus?” My daughter exclaimed, “My Mommy says there is no Santa! But there is a Santa. I know because I saw him sitting in a chair at the fire station.” How could I argue with her? She had publically exposed my parental cruelty and I was looked upon by the clerk in utter confusion.
Later that day I asked my daughter, “Addi, do you really want there to be a Santa Claus?” Her answer was an emphatic “Yes!” “Well fine,” I said, “then there is a Santa.”
Two weeks later Santa brought her a guinea pig. And every time I tell someone her bunk beds are from Ikea, she reminds me, “No Mom, Santa brought them to me.”
Why do I want to blow the Santa myth? Well because it’s worthless, that’s why. I desire only to give my children what is real and true and everlasting. But society thinks otherwise and I find myself challenged again this year.
This year I decided not to come right out and deny Santa's existence, but to ever-so-gently point out the flaws in the Santa theory. I read her the original story of Saint Nicholas…the one about the old man from the Netherlands who dropped gold down the chimney into the poor girls’ stockings. “After he died—oh well, I’ll be, look at that he’s dead—they named him St. Nicholas” I read.
We also didn’t make it to sit on Santa’s lap, but we did visit his reindeer.
I am a harsh cruel Mommy, I know. But I love her too much to build her up on lies, and the truth is this world is a harsh place where children go cold and hungry on Christmas. And those children who are so greatly suffering under the curse of the world are the ones who just may believe that Jesus brings a greater gift than Santa Claus.
One day Addi will see it this way, I pray. But as of today, I stand upon the shaky ground of neither building up nor tearing down her dreams. We’ll see what happens come Christmas….
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