"Christmas Letter 99 "
Good tidings, warm blessings and truck loads of general merryness. I thought I'd send a Jimbo update to celebrate the Christmas season and all the stuff that goes with it. Maybe do a little holiday reflection. It's as good a time as any for digital catharsis.
So I'm sitting alone at about 10PM on a Saturday night in Alta Java, one of my favorite cafes on the Newport peninsula, typing away on this lap top while a decent Celtic band is playing to the nearly full house. I'm in a room full of people, yet I describe my current situation as alone. Weird Freudian digression. Stream of consciousness in action.
I just returned from my 7th annual Wavefunction holiday Christmas party. I try not to go to these things. I never feel comfortable there - it's a holiday tradition I don't enjoy. It's not that I don't like the people I work with, but I spend five days a week with them. They are nice people with nice families, but let's be honest, they are not my friends. I work with them. I don't hang with them. And besides, these events just remind of how bad I would like a new career. Which career I'm still trying to figure out. I'm open to suggestions.
In a couple days I will be going somewhere I do feel comfortable. I'm flying to Dallas on Wednesday. I spend every Christmas with my family and can't imagine spending it any other way. Spending Christmas away from my family is inconceivable to me. Being single can be hard. Being single during the holidays could be brutal. So I'll be glad to go home, even though they will likely drive me right out of the house by Christmas Eve.
If you're alone and away from your family, Christmas wouldn't exactly be the most wonderful time of the year. To really experience the magic of the season, people need to be around families, loved ones - people who for genetics, hormones, or guilt feel they have to put up with you regardless of how annoying you have become.
Decorating a tree is a desperately lonely affair when you're the only one to enjoy the results. So I've never owned a tree. Besides, I'm never home to enjoy it anyway. Christmas cookies? I'd eat all the cookie dough before it made it to the oven. And have you ever tried a non-fat cookie? Besides, all my attempts at baking end in a visit from the fire marshal. Caroling? There's a city ordinance that prevents me from singing outside my shower - it's for the good of the community. SoCal doesn't exactly make me nostalgic for eggnog, snow angels, and ridiculous holiday sweaters. It's just another month of board shorts and sandals. Only now I need to wear a sweatshirt. Other than the annual Newport boat parade, SoCal just doesn't ooze winter wonderland.
It's been a unique Christmas season for me. I didn't do ANY holiday shopping outside my home. I have avoided the malls and did all of my shopping through this 14-inch screen. A few taps on the keyboard and my VISA bill gets steeper and the pile of stuff under my mother's tree gets taller.
I decided to cybershop because malls kick me like I was an Arkansas kid with a drunken pop. I'm a Nordstrom lightweight. I can wake at five in the morning, drive three hours to the desert, hike for another two, climb all day, repeat the whole process, and still won't be as exhausted as I would spending two hours at South Coast Plaza in December. Ten pitches up in Red Rocks, no problem! One short trip to Macys and I need a nap.
Christmas is about giving. So without all the other traditional seasonal cues, it's been rabid, debt-inducing consumerism that reminds me it's Christmas time. The dizzying, store-hopping crowds, the endless circles through parking lot after parking lot, the darting toddler obstacle courses, the overwhelming din of holiday cover tunes, and the way perfectly normal, pleasant people can drive you to criminal behavior just by walking S-L-O-W in front of you.
Yeah, I know the madness that comes from walking into a four level, 70,000 square foot department store in order to buy but one simple gift, and being unable to find ANYTHING you like. Nothing says Christmas like spending three hours looking for one pair of Levi's in the right color and right size but being unable to find the damn jeans in any store in any mall in Southern California. And that's only after you decide between the zipper fly, button fly, Velcro fly, straight leg, baggy leg, wide leg, flared leg, super baggy leg, circus tent leg, carpenter style, painter style, roofer style, drywaller style, stone-washed, pre-washed, acid-washed, dye-washed, or unwashed. Since when did buying pants become an all day affair?
But I digress. Sorry.
Without the mall, Christmas time seems like just another month. Only with bigger bills. So does this mean that next year I'll go back to mall, the crowds, the kids, the muzak, the Excedrin headaches, and leave the internet to more traditional chores like spamming my friends and surfing for porn?
Not a chance.
Merry Christmas, happy Hanukah, joyous Winter Solstice, good shopping, great skiing, safe ice climbing, or whatever this season means to you. I hope you spend it with the people who love you most. And since I can't say it better than Charles…
God bless us, everyone.
