"Develop an interest in life … The world is so rich, simply throbbing with rich treasures, beautiful souls, and interesting people. Forgive yourself.” Henry Miller
Angel ornament handcrafted by friend Gladys Fee ca. 1979
I woke up this morning to a thousand ads in my email in-box. Black Friday is upon us, although I wonder if there is any such thing as Black Friday. There was a time that was the day after Thanksgiving, and noted for shoppers storming the stores and malls for “the best deals of the season” (although that claim was always dubious in the best of times.).
The irony has never been lost, that a day devoted to thanking God for family, friends, football, and feasting is followed by a day of mob violence and commercial madness.
Black Friday, for me, is a day of keeping the shades down, the lights off, and allowing the tsunami of local spendthrifts to crash headlong onto the rocks of financial ruin in their vain efforts to save a buck here or there. Madness. Sheer madness!
I’m not immune to these local customs, of course. I will do my holiday duty in supporting the economy; I just won’t do it today. I will spread it out, and I will do what I can with what I have in hand. I have never subscribed to the idea of going into debt for the holiday.
I am old enough to remember when some of the local stores in Ballard (where I grew up) had Christmas Clubs. People would open (and fund) special accounts specifically for the holidays. Instead of paying interest on money borrowed, they earned interest on these savings accounts – paying themselves for their annual expenses. The stores benefited by having a dependable supply of customers, come December.
We didn’t have a lot of rules in the house in which I grew up, but one I have tried to live by was my father’s maxim: Pay yourself first. Savings accounts earned about four percent interest, home loans cost about six to eight percent, and consumer debt (credit cards) were capped at twelve percent (by law!). Anything over twelve percent was illegal; it was called Usury (excessive interest that violated any sense of decency).
Sadly, those laws went the way of the dinosaur, blown away by the great Asteroid of Greed that accompanied the oil embargoes of the 1970s. Today we’re lucky to make two percent interest on savings and our credit card rates run 21-25 percent (according to recent consumer credit reports).
My father’s other bit of financial wisdom was this: Live according to your means. That’s hard to do. Not because the world is so expensive (which it is), but because we have been trained to want more and more, told we deserve everything the next person has, conditioned to believe that greed is normal, that greed is good, and that we’ll lose out if we let someone else have what we want first. No one wants to be a loser.
It’s tough ignoring all the seasonal “specials” we get blasted with on the telly, emails, or streaming media. It’s hard, but not impossible.
I want to suggest there are other ways to approach the holidays and assure my readers that as fun and “right” as it may feel to spend money buying gifts and fretting over what to get one another and doing everything the holidays seem to demand of us. And what is that “other way” you ask?
Pause.
It cuts against the grain, but find your limits; take time out and know it is OK to decline invitations when you’re not up to it. Jesus took time out from his busy schedule to get away, to meditate and pray, to reconnect with earth, soul, and God. Remember, if you look at the upcoming holidays and find yourself saying, “Jesus, not again!” that is as much a prayer as the Our Father or the Hail Mary. If Jesus needed to pause, how much more the rest of us?
The world goes cold, dark, and silent this time of year. It’s not dead; it’s resting. We don’t need to chase away the darkness. Joy may be found in the peace and quiet of new-fallen snow. The light of God’s presence may be seen in the hearts and souls of those we meet, if only we’d look. Forget Santa Claus. Embrace the Santa Pause here in this, our valley – and be thankful.
Keith Axberg writes on matters concerning life and faith. Author of: Who the Blazes is Jesus? Good News for a Vulgar World (available through Amazon in Print and e-book)
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