That Perfect Gift
The holidays are here, each year a little earlier, each year a little more frantic. The holiday music started hitting the stores in early November and I’ve already seen houses decorated in my neighborhood. But this year frantic hits a new high (or low). It’s bad enough that Black Friday has become de rigueur, but this year otherwise normal, calm people had the opportunity to unbuckle their tight belts, grab their charge cards and run as fast as they could the minute the last piece of pumpkin pie was devoured on Thanksgiving Day. Yes it’s really true, many stores were open on Thanksgiving this year…ALL…DAY…THANKSGIVING.
Maybe I got the meaning of the word Thanksgiving wrong all this time. Maybe the word when broken up means “thanks for giving us yet another day to shop.” It looks like we have been given another day of danger. It used to be that the act of walking down a street in a gang infested neighborhood alone in the pitch dark, with your purse swinging back and forth was considered dangerous. Now we must add another act to our repertoire of dangerous actions – the act of shopping!
We have all seen how dangerous it is to shop on Black Friday. We have seen otherwise reasonable grown adults elbowing their way to the desired rack or table, tackling each other for sale items, ripping clothing from an opponent’s hands, and exhibiting other bizarre behavior all to get that perfect gift. Children are watching their parents doing things that kids would be punished for in a heartbeat. It’s been pretty ridiculous and it seems to be getting worse. I thought with so many online shoppers that this madness would stop. Instead the stores are fighting online shopping by the brilliance of adding more days and hours including Thanksgiving itself.
So what is that perfect gift? Is it the video game marked M for mature that your 9 year old boy is badgering you for? Is it that expensive $200 playhouse that your 2 year old pointed to in an ad? How about the much too skimpy mini skirt that your 13 year old daughter “must have” because her friends’ mothers let their daughters wear them? That toy gun looks way too real, but little Billy wants it so bad. The music on that rapper’s CD has very graphic language, but all your son’s friends have a copy on their iPods. The newest cell phone works great for you, but can your elderly mom or dad master it? Do pets really need clothing? And just how many Lego sets can one child own?
I’m dealing with this the best I can. My plan is this. I told everyone that I believe that holiday gifts should just be for the kids. That will cut things down considerably. I finished buying the gifts for one kid months ago. I just ordered another child’s gifts online. I’ve also ordered tee shirts online for all of them. I found a site that has everything you can imagine in tee shirts. One gets his Walking Dead shirt; another will love her Dr. Who tee. There’s a Diary of a Wimpy Kid ready to go to the one who reads that series and a Dora shirt for the little Dora lover. Everything is done except those special gifts for my teenage grandkids. Now there is a challenge. Teenagers are tough. But wait, the challenge has been met. The purchase has been made and I can’t lose. Today I am giving thanks to that special person who first came up with the perfect gift for teenagers… gift cards… and now I’m done!
Category: Events, Local News
