Things are changing for us...although it doesn't exactly appear like so much change on the surface of things...it's there. And this Christmas marked that change, I believe, more particularly than times before. This 'change' seems thoroughly absorbed and exuded from my children who somehow seem to absorb things more readily and exuberantly than their maternal counterpart. We began this quest toward a more simple life with the jump-off point in the rural countryside of Maine. However, shirking the Dallas metroplex mentality in lieu of backwoods resourcefulness and self-denial has been much less of a 'jump' and more of a 'juxtaposition'...a rather bumpy one at best....for at least one supposedly adult female in the family.
For anyone who may be thinking out there that a rural romantic life in Maine is all pink with no gray...or even purplish-bluish-black....well, please rest assured the darker hues of the color wheel readily mix with all those ephemeral pastels. Which is as it should be, don't you think?? I always love the scrappiest of scrapbooks the best...I suppose because they reflect the real beauty and essential quality in life the best. The dark swirls only edify and punctuate those soft pale happy colors, giving them the background they need to dazzle and shine forth.
So what's the point in all of this exactly? Did I end up with some blue, woe begone Christmas rather than the cheerful white-red-and green one...with silver and gold bells jingling all about me? No, of course not...BUT...I must admit to you, my dear friends, that in the quest for simplicity, I'm afraid, I still have my delusions of CITY ambiguously attached to that 'simpli-'...and 'city' in the sense of all that the Modern-Woman's-Guide-to-the-Perfect-All-Around-Well-Rounded-Christmas Package represents...which means 'presents'...and usually quite a few of them. The Perfect-All-Round-SKIMPY-Christmas doesn't remotely figure into my Holiday vocabulary...much less roll off my tongue very easily. Now, 'skimpy' I realize...is only a state of mind. Believe me, I give myself that lecture with oft-occurring regularity...and sometimes I do manage to believe what I'm telling myself...with not quite so much oft-occurring regularity.
So how does a child-product of the materialistic, consumeristic, Christmas-is-for-gifting-and-lots-of-them wean herself from that state of mind exactly? Especially when she's staring into the voluminous empty gift bags of her 4 children with only 2...count them two...tissue wrapped presents each...then self-consciously stuffed with tissue paper at the top to make them look 'fuller'...and to mask all of that massively voluminous empty white space inside??
As I gazed into those large essentially bare un-filled bags, my panicked thoughts bouncing and echoing off the stark cavernous walls...begging to be filled with something...anything!...all of my 'simple' resolutions vanished and dissipated out the window...poof! Laura and Mary Ingalls of Little House fame were ecstatic with only a penny and a new tin cup for Christmas. The Von Trapp's 'new' farmhouse fell into the cellar at Christmas time...so the children slept in the barn. Despite this catastrophe at 30 below zero, they hung out by the big fireplace on Christmas Day still reveling in their newly acquired farm in Vermont...shambles and all!
But this is the cusp of year 2010. The night before Christmas these days is not filled with visions of sugar plumbs...let's be brutally frank here! I was frantic with guilt...how can my poor children possibly have a nice Christmas with a few books...a few mini-candies...and a couple of oranges in their stocking?? It's just physically impossible, that's all there is to it. I admonished myself, "These are lean times...and when the money's tight, the money's tight."
But...but...but this is America...the land of plenty...the land of box stores, cheap gadgets, plastic in a plethora, and outrageous credit (un)limits....and this is the HOLIDAYS...and all that implies. I was seeing their doleful, neglected eyes on Christmas Morning in my mind's eye already! I couldn't possibly have been happy with two books for Christmas as a child...of course I couldn't...no way!!!!!!! This is just cruel. I'm nothing but a cruel, stingy mother that has inflicted unbearable atrocities onto my own children on all days of days....Christmas morning! How can I possibly sleep peacefully in my bed tonight...and all future nights...for that matter???
Don't they look completely dejected and crushed? Doesn't it look as though their fate of the 'skimpy' Christmas has left them with deep tragic scars for life? Do you see staggering sums in future psychiatric bills from subconscious repressed childhood trauma? In all fairness, they didn't get just that for Christmas. Grandparents sent money that the girls joyfully spent on adding Schleich farm animals to their collection...and a couple of new dollhouse people. And our son bought a venus fly trap plant that has him thoroughly entranced.
And what was their mother's greatest Christmas gift this year? A change....a slowly emerging Freedom. Freedom from the shackles of the 2010 Modern-Woman's-Guide-to.....fill in the blank. Technically we did get snowshoes 'for Christmas' since we picked them up on sale last Spring and hadn't broken them in yet.
So that's what we did. We went for a snowshoe hike down through the wintry woods, discovered lots of animal tracks in the snow, and slipped and slid over a tiny frozen pond. We tromped back at late dusk in the light of Daddy's flashlight to a warm snug house glowing with Christmas lights and red bows. We guzzled hot chocolate and handfuls of crunchy kettle corn. This was the highlight for the children...for ALL of us. To my utter disbelief my children said this was their favorite Christmas Day...ever. And next year they want to make it an entirely homemade Christmas. "Let's make everything ourselves next Christmas, Mommy, OK???!!!! We don't want anything store bought...can we please, Mommy???!!!!"
Sure, why not. Go ahead...torture yourselves...and be happy! : D