I went to Target this morning to pick up a few things and it was surprisingly un-crazy. But I heard two women having a conversation that tempted me to burst in uninvited. One said to the other, "How's he fixed for aftershave? Doesn't he need some?" I wanted to say, "Nooooooooo! No one needs aftershave!" I am not being earnest and grim here, not saying that the only true needs are food and shelter so go give your money to Food for the Poor instead of Target. (But do think about Food for the Poor if you are looking for a good charity. They do great work and keep their costs low too.) You could tell me you needed a cell phone or hair gel and I wouldn't bat an eye. But aftershave is not, will never be, a need. I know I am biased here: I haven't worn perfume since high school and I am married to a man who would no sooner wear aftershave than a crinoline. But that is the most vexing aspect of the retailers' Christmas madness, in my view -- the "need" to find something, anything, that someone on your list might "need," in the loosest possible sense of the word. I should stay away from Target on the 21st of December. It brings out my inner Ebenezer.
My other grinchy thought is about the public schools and their multicultural approach to "the winter holidays." Earlier this week one of my friends described her son's holiday concert: two Hanukkah songs, two Kwanzaa songs, two solstice songs, two Christmas songs. My own kids' teachers seem to be taking a similar "equal time" approach, if the worksheets they're bringing home on the days of Kwanzaa are an accurate indicator. This is somewhat mysterious to me. I think it's a great idea to teach kids about other cultures, other celebrations. But I would be surprised if 1% of the families in this town celebrated Kwanzaa or solstice. We do, however, have a large South Asian community -- I've heard it's almost 3% of the population. This means we can get scrumptious idli and dosa here in a town where Italian food means Olive Garden. More importantly, this must also mean that kids in the schools were celebrating Eid al-Adha yesterday...but I have seen no Eid al-Adha worksheets. Families must have been celebrating Diwali last month, but the Pilgrim hats and Mayflower models came home unaccompanied by stories about the Festival of Light.
And that's not all. I understand, of course, that the public schools are not going to teach my kids about Christian belief. But it vexes me that the "some families celebrate a day called Christmas" materials are exclusively about Santa and flying reindeer. Because, news flash: some families celebrate a day called Christmas with no flying reindeer anywhere in the picture. Some families celebrate a day called Christmas because on that day love enfleshed entered the world to be its redemption, and some families find (okay, this member of this family finds) the Christmas = Santa equation to be intensely annoying. Gah, I guess I should just send the kids to Catholic school next year. But I don't see how "some families celebrate the birth of a baby" is so terribly inflammatory in a discussion of culture and belief.
It seems to me, in sum, that the schools are looking for a way to justify a week of indulgence. (Wednesday: indoor field day. Thursday: class parties. Today: morning in the gym, doing the dances they've been learning in PE; afternoon of movies.) They talk about a seemingly random assortment of holidays along with the secular version of Christmas, while they say nothing about what many real families are celebrating in their actual homes. And that makes me say a hearty "Bah, humbug."
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