I’m confused. In a year when so many have lost jobs and others are just hanging on financially, ads for Black Friday and holiday shopping are as rampant as ever. Are we supposed to pretend things are normal and spend ourselves silly for the holidays? I wrote one of my granddaughters that I’m keeping things simple this year; after all, Christmas is about Jesus so maybe this unusual year will help us find a reset.
When I was a kid, mail day was a big deal, especially in November, when Christmas catalogs began arriving from Sears Roebuck and Montgomery Ward. Of course, mail day was always a big deal; we only had delivery twice a week (updated now to three times.) Any season that brought new catalogs had us poring over the offerings and carefully selecting possibilities.
In the really old days, country people bought a variety of stuff from catalogs—farm tools, hundred-pound sacks of flour or sugar, even prefab houses. By the time I came along those things were available locally, so catalog shopping was for clothing, household needs, and gifts. Catalogs had size charts in the back, and you determined what size clothing to order by what the tape measure revealed.
Shoes were more problematic, especially for growing youngsters. I don’t know what other households did, but my mom had me stand stocking footed on a sheet of paper while she drew around my feet. She sent the paper with the order and requested one size larger, because that pair of shoes, my only ones for winter, needed to last until school was out and I could run barefoot or wear cheap sandals. I wore a lot of shoes with newspaper stuffed in the toes until I grew into them, and the highlight of becoming a teenager was that I could finally have loafers because my feet had stopped growing. By that time, we occasionally got to a town with opportunities for store shopping, but the idea of a mall was still far in the future, as was the notion, for us at least, of buying more than what we needed.
Big box stores and malls simply overwhelm me to this day, so I prefer the shop small idea that is finally being promoted. Catalogs are go-to for many of us again, although online purchases seem to be expanding by leaps and bounds. Some people even buy groceries online—have we come full circle?
However you decide to shop this season, I hope that the credit card won’t get overloaded, and that more creativity will be in play. If you decide to get a jump on Black Friday don’t forget that most of us won’t be going anywhere to show off the new sweater, earrings, or jacket that look inviting online or in the catalog. Maybe settle for warm slippers instead, and be glad you don’t need to send a picture of your foot with the order. Our gift to one another will be a puppy. Being confined at home will allow ample time for housebreaking, but we’ll have to be sure those fuzzy slippers are placed out of reach.