Darwin During the Holidays

My favorite part of Christmas has always been finding just the right present(s) for the people I care about. Surprising my kids when they were little (by putting unexpected but highly hoped for toys under the tree), impressing them as grownups by personalizing my selections for each of them.

Shopping (or even making something by hand) isn’t as much fun as it used to be, though. My sons and their wives have all made good money for years, and they tend to buy whatever they want, whenever they want it. It has become harder and harder for me to get a genuine rise out of them at Christmas.

My son-in-law is younger and it took awhile for him to reach roughly the same point. It was always fun to surprise him and my stay-at-home-full-time-mother daughter with something I knew they wanted but couldn’t afford; but now they’re also in a better financial condition and do without very little. Even their kids seem to have two or three of everything.

What makes buying presents for my grandchildren and great grandchildren still relatively easy, however, is that I carry out a theme, which is… horsies, of course! I keep an eye out all year long to find unique items that reflect their love of horses (for which, I admit, I am largely responsible).

This year I have taken a huge leap. I have announced that I am only giving gifts to the little ones. Guess what. No one seems to care. Except me. It makes me sad. I feel as though I am abandoning a natural talent I’ve cultivated for years, and denying myself a wonderful source of pleasure watching others open their packages from me. But it does take the pressure off at a time when I truly do need to lower my stress level. Not that I’m having an easy time of it, because I am constantly fighting the urge to pick up this or that for one person or another, and stick twenty bucks in a card for someone else; but basically life changes and we must adapt. In my book The Rising Tide Model for Self-improvement I quote Charles Darwin: “It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the ones most responsive to change.”

Frank and I asked others years ago not to give us presents. We have run out of room on our walls to hang things, on our flat surfaces to set things, and in our closets and drawers to stuff things. Our home runneth over and we are at a point where we are passing things on (or sticking them in the attic because we don’t have the heart to toss them -- When the time comes our kids will deal with them appropriately.) We no longer buy for each other on special occasions either. Simply stated there’s nothing we want or need, other than each other and for our loved ones to be healthy and happy.

Well, there is something else: World peace and an end to hunger and homelessness. If you ever come across those available to the public, please let us know. We’ll gladly rush right out with our checkbook.

Merry Christmas, everyone!