A Christmas Story

Not involving putting your eye out

Now, before you get all judgement-y, let me explain why I did this when I was a kid.

. . .

Really, I can’t do better than Jeri’s explanation, because hers is the better explanation.  At least it’s rational and there is an element of practicality to it.  I mean, Grandma spends a chunk of change on a pink and multi, faux fur-trimmed, crushed velvet midi-coat that makes you look like the over-fed child of a Lappland Doctor Who, don’t you want to save her some cheddar by returning it? The trick is to have a plausible pretext for doing it, to spare her feelings (because, if you recall, she smells like certain hard candies taste.  And roses). 

I soon adopted that strategy after committing the plunder to justify my greed and utter lack of impulse control (and developed my perfidy skills).  My parents would go Christmas shopping for hours.  They didn’t indulge in pretense about it.  When they came home, they’d lock themselves in a guest room to do the wrapping before “secreting” the boxes in the attic (in the same way they’d hide the key under the doormat to thwart the burglar).

And, because they were teachers with the world’s most predictable schedule, I knew when and how long I had to carefully unwrap, examine, try on, assess, and restore every gift to its original bow-tied-and-labeled state.  That, I’ll tell you, was no easy feat: my dad was as precise as an origamist when it came to folding paper.  Discovery was always a heart-thumping risk: the man was able to tell my sibling and I had a huge party when they were away in Italy from one small, forgotten cigarette butt in an ashtray.  Well, the slice of pizza on the roof overlooking the pool might have also been an indicator.

I grew out of it before I was a proper teenager.  It really was a joyless, stupid thing to do.  And I like to think that I learned the true value of Christmas, quoth The Grinch: “Maybe Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store. Maybe Christmas . . . perhaps, means a little bit more”.  Wise words.

Also, I got caught.