Bah Humbug

At the risk of inviting three ghosts to visit me tonight I have to say that I am already sick of Christmas. It is November 2nd and I stopped at Walmart to pick up some air-freshener. I found a very helpful employee who immediately stopped her conversation with another employee to assist me in my search. Where are the air fresheners,” I asked. “Let me show you”, she volunteered, and proceeded to lead me across the entire store. “I’ll show you the Christmas scents first,” she chirped, looking back at me and smiling like a tour guide. Not wanting to be rude, I smiled and followed, figuring we’d visit the other scents soon enough. Several blocks later we came to a display featuring scented candles in red and green promising all the smells of the Holiday season. But I didn’t want a candle; I wanted air freshener. So we set off again, eventually coming to an entire aisle filled with Glade and Airwick and Febreze products; just what I was looking for. She recommended the Febreze plug-ins and they were even on sale! ( The exclamation point represents her enthusiasm.) So I started looking at the boxes: Caramel Apple, Holiday Harvest, Cinnamon Spice, Pine… wait a minute! All the scents were for Christmas. “Is this it,” I asked. “Do you have anything for normal people?” The crack was out of my mouth before I could stop it. Luckily, the nice lady laughed. “Normal people,” she repeated, still laughing. I hadn’t meant to be rude but surely there are other people who don’t need the house to smell like trees or baking; other people who aren’t obsessed with Christmas cheer. Seriously! The Christmas season is almost as long as baseball season and that goes on forever!

Please note: I don’t hate “Christmas”. I hate the commercialism of Christmas. I hate the pressure to spend. I hate the need to spend! I hate that the entire economy is threatened with collapse if people don’t spend at Christmas. I hate that people will spend money they don’t have rather than show up empty-handed on Christmas. I hate that I am one of those people. I’d love to say, “Let’s not do Christmas” but for half my family, this is a big deal! If I play the Jewish card, it means ostracizing myself from the entire part of the family that is not Jewish. It means not seeing them when everybody else is bustling from house to house to pick up and deliver presents. And if I do manage to see them during the hustle and bustle of Christmas cheer, how can I do so with empty hands?

Can I give them air freshener?