I dislike shopping. Shopping for Christmas gifts is not real high on my priority list. I believe it to be a myth perpetuated by shop keepers and ad agencies, we are all sucked into their shopping vortex. Some are sucked in so hard and trampled on by so many sometimes they die. Shopping can kill you.
Just because some wise men from the east brought some gifts to a special baby in a manger, does not mean we should be assaulted with Christmas Carols and Christmas Shopping way before Halloween. How and why did Christmas become something I believe it is not? Christmas has become a shopping nightmare. Some stores invite you to Christmas in July. That is just SICK. I would like to forget Christmas shopping all together. Does that mean I would forget Christmas? NO, I would just like it to mean something again, on a non shopping level. I yearn so for the simpler times...perhaps with the recession now a certainty (for the past year) and a depression on the horizon more people will "GET IT." Some will be forced too get it and realize a pair of socks under the tree or something homemade or handmade and from the heart is the real treasure, that and the Christmas Story read out loud from the Bible. ( end of sermon.)
I guess I should take a class in shopping, like remedial shopping, or maybe shopping for dummies. I am a female, shouldn't I have been born with some type of shopping gene? Or am I deficient in some type of hormone? What is wrong with me?
Believe you me, I have pondered this for years. If I could find all of the Christmas gifts I am required to purchase in a Bookstore, Antique Shop, Auction Sale or the local Thrift Shop or even a Garage Sale..I would be the best shopper around. When I realized this, I realized it is not me that has the problem..but the gifted, you know the people who get the gifts. The gift I choose that will say I love you, you are special misses something in translation. I am a failure, I always get the wrong gift in the wrong size, wrong kind, wrong color..wrong, wrong, wrong..like a big old buzzer going off in my head. Then one day I just said to myself "Self, this is madness, stop the shopping cart."I also told Far Guy if he wanted to shop he could, far be it from me to hold anyone back from shopping. I did assist him for a few years until he finally saw the light, and it was a blue light special.
CASH! In a Card! Low and behold, it might not always be the right size, but after Christmas you can buy twice as much with your cash. I do buy a few gift certificates at local restaurants. I do not purchase gift cards. I will shop for Far Guys gift online, I know exactly what I want him to want ..he has not mentioned it for years..but I just know if I can find it..he will declare me the best shopper ever! Chance will probably join right in, cause he is easily bought with a few yummy treats:)
another HEAR HEAR from this corner.
ReplyDeleteI detest the shopping mania.
Oh,,,,,,,,,,did you EVER speak my heart!
ReplyDeleteLinda
http://coloradofarmlife.wordpress.com
Agreed!! I could've written this. I should've written this. I'm going to copy this and put it on my blog and say I did write this:)) (I'll leave farguy and chance out, of course)
ReplyDeleteI couldn't agree more. This shopping stuff is for the birds!
ReplyDeleteYesterday, I accompanied someone who was wanting to find some readings for a carol and mince-pie evening.
ReplyDeleteShe said the readings they usually have are fine but she'd like to introduce some new things too.
Christmas anthologies aren't my kind of thing so I've never looked for one before. I was taken aback when we couldn't find one. I thought they'd be everywhere.
Then I started looking at what's around for Christmas in a wider way . . . very little in the shops seemed to have anything at all to do with it. It wasn't just that they had nothing to do with the Christian festival, they had nothing to do even with the secular celebration of it . . . just tinsel spread over ordinary (tatty / gift-wrapped / over-priced / who-would-want-one-anyway) THINGS.
No Christmas poems. No Christmas memories. Just ordinary (and rubbishy) THINGS!
* * * * *
With shopping, I decide what I want before I set out . . . go only to the shops where these things are sold . . . march up to the counter . . . buy them . . . march out . . . go home. It's more like a raid than an expedition.
Lucy
I could not have said it better!!
ReplyDeleteOur house has never been one for doling out gifts.
Sometimes criticized by others, but money and the true meaning of Christmas, well, they butt heads. True Meaning ALWAYS wins!
I agree with you too, I don't like shopping, I stopped buying gifts for my kids, along time ago, because they were hard to buy for for all the reasons you mentioned. So I give them money. All but one of my husband's kids and grandkidslive out of state, sometimes the cost of sending a gift is more than the cost of the actual present. So we started to send money to them as well.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree, somewhere along the line we have changed into a gift obsessed society looking for the perfect gift.
ReplyDeleteFor many years [ decades ] I have avoided asking friends and family what they got for Christmas, instead focusing on how they enjoyed Christmas. It certainly is not about what you got.
Jen
You're correct in stating that Christmas is extremely commercialized. However, I don't think we may see as much mania in the malls this year as the economy is affecting so many people they are choosing not to spend as much.
ReplyDeleteI agree! I hate shopping - and totally lack this gene. Sir Pe does the weekly food shop. I do OK when shopping online for kids' clothes via an auction site (like E-bay but smaller and Swedish) where I can buy good second-hand clothes.
ReplyDeleteOtherwise - no thanks! (Unless it happens to be shopping for books or earrings or chocolate...)
I totally agree with you!
ReplyDeleteYou put it all so well.
Have a great weekend.
Pam
I'm deficient in the shopping gene department too! I like it that way.
ReplyDeleteWe stopped shopping for Christmas years ago. It just ran up credit card bills and then debt so instead we do homemade items. There's nothing I like better than a plate of cookies or brownies or a drawing by a child.
ReplyDeleteA donation to a charity has also been high on my list too.
I like the spirit of Christmas to be present without the commercialism.
You are definitely not alone.
I was born without the shopping gene, too. Looks like it isn't as rare as we sometimes think.
ReplyDeleteI do all my shopping on-line or make something or give money.
My youngest granddaughter is getting one of my small looms (downsizing and making her happy all in one shot). The other is getting money to buy what she wants.
My sister is getting a note from Heifer's Inc for a llama (hope she doesn't read this). That way she can "have" a llama and be generous at the same time.
I have bought for the boys in the family, but kept the prices way down this time.
I hate the commercialization of Christmas - I remember fondly of the time when Christmas decorations came out the day AFTER Thanksgiving.
Keep up the good work - do not shop!!!