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All right, I admit it, gift-wrapping is not my forte’. I am looking at my recently wrapped pile of Christmas presents for my husband and am once again forced to come to this horrible realization. Is there perhaps a class I can take? A website that shows you the ins and outs of proper wrapping? Is there no help for me?
Long, long ago, my husband took over the gift-wrapping job in our family. I have been regulated to tag duty only and it works out pretty well except for the fact that he cannot wrap his own gifts. My husband does not appreciate the ease, sensibility, and loveliness of gift bags – he wishes to “unwrap” his gifts, forcing me into my yearly panic of gift-wrapping. I dread this task and put it off until the last possible minute, usually Christmas Eve. It usually takes me a glass of wine or two to be able to break the gifts out of their hiding place and face the inevitable daunting task – yes, it’s true, I have gift-wrapping issues.
I know that that whatever gene that causes you to have this particular talent has skipped right over me and gone straight to my daughters. I know however, that the gene does in fact run in my family as my sisters all have that particular strain of DNA. Their gifts come meticulously wrapped with those cute little curly-q bows, you know the ones. You can just tell they spent hours wrapping these gifts and making these ribbons of brightly colored delight. I on the other hand, have even forgone the little stick-on bows as even the simple task of their proper placement upon the package eludes me and they seem to fall off just as I am placing them beneath my tree. My sisters also use cute little “To-From” cards, their penmanship as always, elegant. Me? I just hope to spell the names right (what is that kid’s name?) and not screw up the peel and stick tag but even those seem to frequently end up in the wrong place at the wrong time. I had a sister-in-law once upon a time, who would even go so far as to match the pattern on the wrapping paper so that it appeared endless, without a beginning or end, perfect. I sometimes have to cut little strips of paper and tape them onto the gifts because I cut the paper too small to begin with. I can see why she no longer wishes to be related to me.
There is yet another problem of mine to which I must fully confess, I can’t cut straight to save my life. I start off okay but then end up an inch off one way or the other therefore resulting in the necessity of patching the wrapping job. They used to make wrapping paper just for us scissor challenged folks, it had a grid on the back and everything, I often wonder why they stopped selling that. My guess is, with us “crooked cutters” roaming the countryside, using more and more paper in the wrapping process, and killing virtually hundreds of trees with each passing holiday, that more wrapping paper production is required and what self respecting wrapping paper company doesn’t want that. There it is folks, Capitalism at its finest.
And how do I wind up with all that extra paper on the ends? I trim what I think is enough but still end up with a wad of paper that seems to be an inch thick and has at least five edges to it. It takes four pieces of tape to hold it all into place. Speaking of tape, who decided to make it invisible? Whose idea was that? Once you get it off the roll and onto your finger you can’t see it any longer and you just have to pray it goes where you want it. Usually I find I have just missed the edge and other piece is required, once more adding to the bulkiness of my wrapping job. Not to mention the wrinkle that I often find in the middle of tape after it is already in place. Another embarrassing moment in my reality.
But I trudge along, making my way through the tape, wrapping paper, and bows until my task is completed for another holiday season. My misshapen packages are hidden once more from sight and I can breathe easier once again, my panic attack now firmly behind me. And besides the only thing that truly matters is the thought behind the gift, right?
Did I remember to remove the price tags?
After working nearly ten years in the criminal justice system I thought I had heard and seen it all but once again I am proven wrong. There are now “anti-obesity activists” (who knew?) and an organization called National Action against Obesity. Now, while I believe this in itself is absurd, the more appalling news is that they are trying to “trim the fat” from your shopping center Santa because they believe his chubbiness sets a bad example for children. Apparently there is already a campaign in place in Britain to have the holiday Santa’s’ performing aerobics in the malls to set a better role model for children. I find this disturbing on sooo many levels.
First, I agree that obesity is a problem, there are more overweight children and adults in the world than ever but lets not lay the blame at the floor beneath the black boots of Old St. Nick. The simple fact is that we are a world of gluttons. We have always wanted more, more for our money, more bang for our buck. So the fact that restaurants are serving over-sized and super-sized meals is merely a sign of the times. In other words, you wanted it, you got it. But then came the hard part, personal responsibility. Just because they offered it, doesn’t mean you had to eat it. You know, it is perfectly acceptable to bring home that other half of that humungous sandwich (not the fries though, no way to heat them up.) and eat it later. When a friend of mine and I go out to lunch, we often share a meal. I order the side, she orders the sandwich and then we share. There is more than enough there for the two of us. Now, we both could order our own meals and eat them all by ourselves but we know better than that. For one, sharing saves us a lot of money and two, we do not overindulge. I know, the unfortunate thing is we have to want the same thing for lunch but generally that is okay for us, we do and we are better off for it. Also, dinner plates. Who knew a small change like the size of a dinner plate could alter our perception so much? Apparently 50 years ago the average size dinner plate was between 8 to 10 inches wide and now the average plate is 12 inches wide (more gluttony in action) yet we keep piling on the food to keep up with the size of our plate! Once again, who knew? It’s like we have been setting ourselves up for fatness. Perhaps this is a conspiracy by other countries to get us out of shape and then swoop in and take over. After all, aren’t many dishes made overseas? In places like China? But I digress, back to personal responsibility. In other words, you don’t have to fat (unless perhaps you have a condition – in which case this would not apply to you). We are a world of fat people for the most part because we eat too much and don’t exercise, there I’ve said it, its out in the open. Surprise!
Second, why would a child choose Santa as role model? While we all love him, watch movies and cartoons about him and pretty much idolize him, I don’t think we have ever wanted to “be” him. Doesn’t he have that gig pretty much sewn up? While he has some wonderful attributes that we should all strive for, giving of ourselves to the betterment of mankind, for instance, I don’t think anyone thinks of him as a role model per se, not anymore than the Easter Bunny or Tooth Fairy anyway. Children see him for what he is, a wonderful, generous, jolly old soul without a thought to his chubbiness, unless of course we as adults have brought it to their attention. Looking at Santa will not make your child fat. Children see athletes, models and celebrities a lot more than they do Santa and looking at the likes of those folks won’t make your child slim and trim either. No one can make your child healthy and have good eating habit. No one that is, except you.
Let’s face it folks, we are the role models for our children, not some guy they see once a year, no matter how popular he is. If you overeat, chances are good your kid is going to overeat also. If you don’t exercise, chances are good neither will your kids. That’s really all there is to it; you don’t have to be a genius to figure it out. So I say, leave St. Nick alone, one chubby Santa does not a world of fat people make.
Is there such a thing as popular hair? I believe so. After maneuvering my way through high school without what was considered popular hair, I suddenly found myself on the other side of street so to speak and in my mid-twenties I became one of “those” girls.
I went to school in the sixties and early seventies when hippies were where it was at and every girl wanted to look like Peggy Lipton, with long, straight beautiful hair, parted right down the middle. I have naturally wavy hair and I was definitely at a distinct disadvantage to all the girls with perfect hair. I tried ironing my hair (with an iron, yes that is what we did), and sleeping with soup cans rolled in my hair but I was never quite good enough. I was teased and picked on for my plain-ness and unfortunate hair throughout high school and for a couple of years after graduation. But something happened in the late seventies that changed all that.
In 1976 a television showed called Charlie’s Angels aired, Farrah Fawcett became an angel, and my social life changed forever. Farrah had gorgeous, full hair with luscious full curls. Everyone that was around at that time remembers “the” poster. The gorgeous Farrah sitting in a one-piece red bathing suit, smiling those beautiful teeth for all to see, her long blond locks falling everywhere. All of a sudden straight hair was out and curly was in. I found my long blond hair was made to order for Farrah hair and with the invention of hot curlers I was transformed. No longer the plain girl with the “just not straight enough hair,” I was the girl with the great hair, the girl all the other girls envied, the girl the other girls hated.
I guess I never really thought about it much, how my life changed at that point. I grew up and came into my own and by the mid-eighties I was considered one of the more sought after girls but it wasn’t until a supervisor at a job I was at, made a comment that really hit it home for me. Her animosity was apparent whenever she spoke to me and one evening, with a tone of indignation in her voice she quipped, “I’ll bet you were a cheerleader too.” I can still see her face and the disgust as she looked at me and I can still feel the shock as her words slapped me as sure as if it had been her hand. I was surprised enough that I couldn’t say anything for a few minutes, I was accused of being a cheerleader. I knew what that meant to me and I was pretty sure I knew what it meant to her. Suddenly being a cheerleader took on a new meaning. My looks now fit the bill but I wanted no part of that particular group and resented that I was being categorized because I now fit someone’s idea of who I was on my looks alone, based on my popular hair. When my hair didn’t fit in, I was teased, but when it did fit into someone’s bizarre notion of what was acceptable, I was then despised. It was then that I realized that people look at you and see what they want to see and no matter who you used to be or who you really are, most people do not care to look to see what is underneath.
Many years have passed since high school and I still am changing on the outside. My face has laugh lines and my dimples are fading but I am okay with that, I still have pretty great hair. I learned a great many things through my experiences in high school, the least of which is never judge a book by its cover. I make it a point to be nice to everyone on first meeting and still choose my friends for their wit, intelligence and kindness. Some of my friends are beautiful, others brilliant, a couple are both. I have found one simple truth that’s stood the test of time for me – you deserve my respect until you don’t, no matter who you are or what you look like. Always remember, hair today, gone tomorrow.
