The Therapeutic Properties of Bubble Wrap

This morning, when the sun rose fully over our property (around 8 am), I was struck by how blue the sky was, and how stark the trees looked. After three days of mild but viciously windy weather, they are finally bare. I loved watching them sway. It was like a bittersweet dance; they gave up their leaves so gracefully. The smell of their multi-colored offerings, burning, decaying, is now pungently spiking the air that wafts through my evening window. Perched on a hill, I can now, from the vantage point of our kitchen windows, see the road below clearly.

Now that the end of Fall looms ever-nearer, I find myself in the same place year after year. I have done little, if any, Christmas shopping! Each December 25th, as I pack away my own booty and sigh with relief that I don’t have to do any more last-minute shopping, I make this ridiculous pact with the commerce gods: This year, I’ll shop early and be done by Thanksgiving.

But it's not just the stress of getting my sh*t together (as woefully un-together as it is). I dread negotiating with commercialism and exchanging gifts with relatives who really don't need any more bloody stuff. I know I don't; there are days when I'd rather nestle a few grenades in strategic corners and clear the decks.

Here's a fantasy: my family and I have a serious sit-down, in which we pleasantly agree that anyone over the age of 30 bows out of the exchange. All the money we would normally spend on each other, we'd pool together and donate to The Red Cross, or an equally deserving organization. A Festivus with a purpose ...

Shake it off. Reality is closing in fast, and making me grumpy. Thanksgiving decorations are awfully slim; it’s all given way to Christmas. But in place of a mass for Christ, it's a mass exodus to Wal-Mart.

And the commerce god said, let there be a blue light special, and he looked upon it, and knew it was good.

*phbbbblt* I categorically raspberry the commercial behemoth that drives this capitalist soul-less spinning ball ever closer to its doom.

I need some bubble wrap.