Unseasonable

It is hard to feel like Christmas is approaching when it’s 82 degrees out, and leaves are still on the trees, and the wind is warm and fine, and the days feel just like spring. What’s going on?

So I had to try to do some Christmas shopping in all this unseasonable weather when I would rather have been bundled up and my cheeks rosy and cold in the frosty air. But it was not to be. The shop I went into with such hopefulness was disappointing. It seemed bare this year and so expensive. I never have enjoyed shopping at this time of year. Plodding down store aisles in grim determination to just buy something, anything for that person on the list, has always been one of my least favorite things to do.

Yes, Christmas is way too commercial. It seems like our whole consumer-based economy is teetering on the brink each year as we wait to see how much shoppers spend during the month between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Sad, really. We should forget all the getting and spending and “laying waste our powers,” as the poet says, and attend to the really important things in life, such as friends, family, and loved ones. Such as assessing how we are living our lives and whether we are up to the grand challenges of each day. Asking ourselves whether we are wasting our lives and frittering away our time on inconsequential things. Not whether we can cram more toys under the tree from Toys R Us.

Downtown Charleston is beautiful at Christmas. All the stores are lit up. But King Street has changed over the past decade. It used to have a nice mix of locally-owned stores, and it was fun to shop there. Now there are all the fancy chain stores like Gap, Banana Republic, Gucci, Saks Fifth Avenue, Abercrombie and Fitch, and the like. The Gucci store in the Charleston Place luxury 5 star hotel complex always gets me. It’s so ostentatious that it’s amost absurd. It’s funny. Who on earth really pays that kind of money for the stuff they sell? The clerks seems like well-dressed mannekins.

As I was passing that high couture store, a man held out a paper cup. “Sir, can you help a homeless man tonight? I hardly ever have that happen to me. It’s not like Charleston has some Grand Central Station where all the mendicants gather. So, I have vowed never to just pass by without giving something when I am asked, so I reached in my pocket and gave him a bunch of change. But I did not do it happily. And after he said thank you, and I had started walking away, I just had to say to him, “Now use that for something to eat.” I felt like a fool. What idiocy! Who am I to tell him what to do. He has a free will and a conscience. Am I trying to just salve my own guilty middle class conscience? So what if his take for the night buys him some drugs or a quart of high octane malt liquor? Who am I to judge? Maybe it will get him through the night.

I walked down the street to another high-end gift emporiium with all kinds of cool and neat gifts you can find absolutely nowhere else. Sparkling with affluence and artsyness. I wandered around in the story in a half daze for a few minutes and then left.

Yesterday driving to work, I was listening to the song, “Chestnuts Roasting Over an Open Fire,” and I was probably debating turning the air conditioning on in the car. I couldn’t feel too Christmassy. But this weekend it will be in the upper 30s. Maybe Jack Frost will soon pay us a visit. And those Christmas lights in fastastic patterns and colors that cover some of the nearby yards and houses — all that holiday cheer in the twinkling lights — I think the people who put up those lights must know something.

It seems that Christmas cheer is in short supply this year with people. So my christmas wish for you is…frost on the pumpkin, a brisk wind…and ice crystals hanging from the trees. 🙂

“…with all kinds of cool and neat gifts…Sparkling with affluence and artsyness.” Oh, that gave me a chuckle. And I know all too well how Christmas shopping takes its toll as we “wander around in the store in a half daze for a few minutes” before we leave. Thousands of us wandering around wondering what in the hell we are looking for! Ah well, laughter is a good defence as any. [Cloistere

It allows me to forget for a moment how incredibly sad we have become. Long live commercialism, eh? 🙁

Jack Frost…is that him?? I should send him to you Oswego! He’s here you know? And yesterday he made me realize that two legs are often not enough, even four can be difficult! Rain suddenly started to pour down after a week of frost…yes…just when I was on my way to school. Can you imagine what happened to all the people who were on the streets, walking on “only” two legs?

One moment I wished I had four, but when I then saw a lady and her dog, the poor annimal had problems with his too many legs and could hardly stay straight up…:) I agree with you Oswego about Christmas…I still have to do my shopping. Like usual I am very late with that. Take care!

Christmas is just another day in December :/

It occurs to me that I think I like presents best when they are still wrapped. All that mystery…anything could be inside…sort of disappointing when it turns out to be gloves or something. Anyway, my tree is cloaked with gifts wrapped in foil and ribbons. It looks good. I feel guilty.

This is the mildest Kansas winter I can remember. I had the door and windows open last week and it is going to hit the 60’s today. I remember this time last year, we were freezing and knee deep in snow. It just doesn’t seem like December in Kansas now, but in Kansas if you don’t like the weather, wait about 5 minutes, and it will change.

I am a fan of pretty twinkle lights, corny as it sounds. Our economy is a far cry from simplicity…I make gifts and cards as much as I can…It has always brought me joy during a time that has always been bittersweet, ever since I was small…I hope you find a way to honor your own simplicity & a way to get away from the big consumerism.

My friend that goes to school in Charleston complains about those stores. She says that things like that make Charleston a nicer place to visit than to live. Although she also tends to complain about things. But in an endearing way, if that makes any sense.

I hated LA because it was like 90 on Christmas Day the year I was there. It’s just . . . wrong. Even in NY this year is’ near 70. And the commercialization detracts from the spirit. it’s ridiculous seeing decorations for sale before it’s even Thanksgiving . . . take care, my friend. sorry for the long absense from IM. It’s been . . . interesting here 🙂

My God! You live in the paradise! It is a black cold in Paris. I am frozen, I hate the cold. I want the sun, some sweetness in the air, I want to walk without being dressed as one Eskimoes. You have an extraordinary luck. You also have a great talent to make us share the charm and the languor of this enchanted city…Happy Holidays..

I was in Charlston in 1986, and fell in love with the downtown. Even took the horse carridge tour, and the tour of historic houses. It saddens me to think it has been yuppified, and upscaled. The old city had a class that no amount of money could buy. I guess you could call it family, or old money, but it ws definatly CLASS!!

Must be difficult to have Christmas feelings in this temperature! At least to me, it would. You are so right abt Christmas and commers. – many and expensive gifts seem to be the thing to many people. In the newspaper today a journalist had found out that every child gets 16 presents to a sum of 300 $. And from before they have too many toys.. Cracyness.

I’ve been doing spring cleaning rather than Christmas shopping. I’ve been using my air conditioner in my car this December. The only snowflakes I see are paper ones pasted to windows. You can still see people in shorts in the city. We had one day of snow…ONE…and were back to the air conditioners that same week. I don’t know where my winter clothes are because I haven’t needed them. [Eri

I remember winter but its seasonal characteristics are like a favorite relative who used to come regularly and surround us with strength and vitality and who now has become too elderly to leave the house much. To find winter now, you have to seek it out and visit it elsewhere.

i hate christmas. i am glad to be home in the wonderful city of charleston; the air, the familiar faces, that undefinable aura that just makes you feel like your home. i think the christmas spirit has been replaced with money, and corrupted with the corporate world. i wonder, HAS THE SPIRIT OF CHRISTMAS BEEN OUT BOUGHT? will it ever return? humanity has been replaced, with hostility. where has

where has christmas gone?