And on to Christmas!

Disclaimer: I am a religious Christian believer. While it is never my intention to offend or alienate others, I am not ashamed of my beliefs or my quest to follow Christ, and I will not hide or minimize them. What is celebrated in this household is Christmas. We joyfully observe the birth of Christ as well as the zany, joyous, secular cultural festival that draws on traditions both ancient and modern. We respect and honor other traditions, and welcome all to our table. 


In that spirit, I feel it's fair to warn readers that what follows is a Christmas observance. If that will bother you, please consider moving on in peace. I'll be back soon with a jovial snark about processed food or bad grammar.

Annnnnnnddd . . . the headlong death spiral to Christmas is ON!

We can no longer hide behind well-intentioned (and fully self-deluding) notions of "one holiday at a time" or "I'm going to enjoy Thanksgiving FIRST" or "I refuse to get all upset over the most joyous time of year." 

Wishbones have been wished upon, pumpkin pies have been alternately lapped up and sneered at, teenagers have been forced into awkward professions of what they're grateful for, and tetrazzini/turkeybird soup recipes have damn near broken the Internet. We've waxed rhapsodic about how dearly we love a slice of leftover breast on good, toothy sourdough with a schmear of cranberry sauce and maybe a dot of sage dressing. Some of us camped out at hellish hours to catch "Black Friday" sales, while others sneered from aloft at the crass materialism of it all.

Now we deck halls; we play reindeer games; we hark as herald angels sing; we wrap and we shop and we bake and we whisper about beautiful surprises that we hope with all our might will delight the ones we love. We lose wrestling matches with strings of lights; we drop hundreds of dollars on wrapping paper and gift tags because damnit, we just can't find the ones we got for pennies on the dollar last year; we vow to finally replace those Godawful-ugly stockings no matter how hard the kids protest; and we drive ourselves mad trying to choose the prettiest and most functional packaging to show off our cookies and candies. All in the hopes that we will indeed do our little part to bring peace on earth and goodwill to all in the name of the Prince of Peace.

And this just days after we (theoretically) celebrated gratitude by shoving stale bread up a turkey's derriere, pronouncing a gelatinous pile of bitter berries "delicious," and partaking in vigorous debates about the history and heritage of a now-controversial holiday.

But there's no escaping it. Somehow Thanksgiving came and went, and now we're all in.

We are an odd lot, we merry revelers. We spend Advent in a lather of activity and busy-ness, overfunctioning, and thinking we can somehow make the magic if we just work a little harder, stay up a little later, add a little more glitter. We're oddly purpose-driven and frantic, and we frequently overlook our innate need for silence and contemplation. Some of us take the religious aspect of the upcoming season to heart, others less so, others not at all. 

But we are of one mind in at least one thing: We want--we hope--we crave--we hope to participate in creating--a time of peace and joy, a time when humans come together in a spirit of love--of fun and renewal and most of all, peace. How we get there, and how we surmount the boulders along the way, are extremely personal matters, but we're all reaching for something bright and beautiful, something that sparkles and shines in a chaotic and troubled world, something that's embodied in the season's message of hope and renewal. We want that beautiful gift for ourselves (oh, admit it, you do too!), we want it for those we love the most, and at this blessed time of year, we seem to want it for all the world.

And it's something I fervently wish for all my friends.

Merry everything, everybody.

On Black Friday, Hope and Promise

There's a loud and vigorous public debate about what's come to be called "Black Friday," with spillover about stores opening on Thanksgiving Day. Everyone seems to have a strongly held opinion. I don't -- well, not one I'm going to share in public.

What I do have is vivid memories of shopping on what, in a simpler time, we called "the day after Thanksgiving." 

The holiday itself was a bit of a trial for me as a child -- my mother and grandmother were atrocious cooks who genuinely hated being in the kitchen. My father, an excellent and enthusiastic cook, did what he could, but was limited by my mother's insistence that she and Neenie had everything under control (only true if you mean "controlled burn") and that Daddy should sit down and relax and watch football. (It wasn't until much later that she admitted she was trying to adhere to the gendered expectations of the era, but hell, arson is arson and she should have just let Daddy do it, "wifely responsibility" be damned.) Eventually, to everyone's relief, I took over the cooking, freeing Mother and Neenie to fuss and fret over the nuances of table setting. They managed to spend hours on it, even for our tiny family. Daddy watched football until the end of his days. 

So we got through it. Every year we got through it.

But the day after Thanksgiving -- ohhhhhhhhh, that was a holiday! Mother and Neenie had pie for breakfast and drew up battle plans for their assault on the old apple boxes in the garage that stored approximately 748,962 Christmas-tree ornaments. Daddy shrewdly taught me from earliest toddlerhood that the smart kids fled that scene.

As soon as we could politely break away from breakfast, we'd get dressed up -- yes, DRESSED UP -- for a Big Day Out. Somehow he always managed to "find" a dress from his back-to-school garment district raid on M. David Children's Wear that he'd "forgotten" to give me in September. Most years, I'd beg to wear my "shiny blacks" (patent-leather Mary Janes) with my spiffy new dress. Mother would resist ("Jack, she'll get them all scuffed!") and Daddy would wear her down ("Sunshine, I'm taking the child SHOPPING, not running through the mud!").


He was the handsomest Daddy ever in a white shirt, tie and jacket (usually Harris tweed). Near the moment of departure, Neenie would call me into her room, close the door, and give me some shopping money, along with strict, whispered instructions not to tell Mother and Daddy. While Daddy was putting the last touches on his Windsor knot and cufflinks, Mother would drag me into my room "because I need to talk to you, young lady," punctuated by a laser-sharp kelly-green stare. Then she'd give me some money, along with similar instructions not to tell Daddy and Neenie. In the car, Daddy brought home the three-peat -- "Don't tell Mother and Neenie I gave you this, but you're going to need a little Christmas money," he'd say with a wink. 

I don't remember the term "mall" from those years, but we'd go to one of the nicer "shopping centers," sometimes Fashion Island or South Coast Plaza; sometimes Anaheim Plaza (when Robinson's was still an independent store, and a very nice one). My dad had an excellent eye, and always picked out clothes and accessories for Mother and Neenie that fit beautifully and looked gorgeous. He got his "Sunshine" her favorite perfume every year, and dressy white gloves for my grandmother. 

He'd help me pick out my gifts for them. My mother collected pins, most of which I still have, and I loved to browse through them for her. Daddy taught me to be persnickety -- it was always costume jewelry, of course, but it had to be tasteful costume jewelry. Nothing else would do for his Sunshine. Neenie always got a new robe, for which the overwhelming selection criterion was softness. Daddy was good at that too. 

But what stands out isn't the stuff -- there was always excellent stuff, some years more, some years less, but always thoughtfully chosen with the recipient's pleasure in mind. But, now, the stuff matters so much less than the intangible moments. One year the Loara High School choir was singing at Anaheim Plaza and Daddy insisted we stop and listen. I thought I was hearing angels; to my ear, they were flawless. I can still hear their "Adeste Fideles" and still see them on the risers in concert dress. 

Another year, some youth organization was doing a "canned presents" fundraiser. Whatever you bought, within reason, could be sealed in a "can" for a few dollars. My dad thought that was the cutest gag he'd ever seen, so he had a sweater for Mother and a blouse for Neenie "canned." During the great Christmas Eve gift-opening extravaganza, he eventually got around to telling them there was a little can opener attached to the bottom of each can, but not before memorializing their giggling frustration in Polaroid. 

The best day after Thanksgiving lunches were usually at one of the Knott's Berry Farm restaurants, to which my dad would happily drive from almost anywhere. Lunch with Daddy was always fabulous -- well, except for the year I got chicken-liver gravy on a white linen dress. But my dad said he'd handle Mother's chagrin over the stain, and I guess he did, because I'm still here.

The finale was always the very best part. Every year, my dad bought each of us a Christmas pin, and every year it was the last thing he did on that shopping trip. Some were a bit rhinestone-ish; most were more subdued. But every single one was beautiful to a little girl, and Daddy had such fun picking them out. The man was capable of getting into actual conversations with sales ladies over the merits of a gold ornament pin vs. a green Christmas tree pin. We all acted duly surprised when he gave them to us that night as we stood around admiring what Mother and Neenie had done with the Christmas tree.

Everybody's gone now, but I still have those pins and I wear them happily, despite missing rhinestones and faulty pinning mechanisms. Those pins tell the story of my family's holidays -- sure, it was a flawed family with heartache and hurt amid the joy -- but the love has never left, and I believe it never will.

And I suppose that's why I take a fairly benign view of "Black Friday." I guess a part of me wants to believe there's a dad out there spending the whole day teaching his little girl how to give from the heart. And I'm sure there is -- I'm sure there are hundreds of them. If you know of anything to the contrary, promise you'll never tell me.