Just got off the phone with my mother and weaponized her intellect towards choosing gifts. “I have no idea what these people want,” I pleaded.
“Everyone likes cologne,” she proffered.
Every year around this time I have what my dear friend Maggie and I like to call, “Panic at the Discount”. It comes from a few years back when, in a last minute spree of gift-giving, I had a panic attack in the housewares aisle of the Studio City Marshalls. I remember mental images of the dozen or so people I was getting gifts for flickering like my life flashing before my eyes, and then shelves of last-season’s home decor spooling like slot reels. I didn’t know if anyone would want an olive wood cutting board. I didn’t remember if I’d gotten them one last year. Everything went white.
I soon composed myself and wandered, zombie-like, through the clothing area to the car, but the damage had already been done. And I realized that most of this was due to the fact that I could never put together as good of a Christmas as my mom could.
My mom learned from her mom: Christmas is the time to put everyone’s differences and miseries aside and make sure everyone has one hell of a party, from ages 2 to 92. My grandmother made 500 raviolis one year (as she was fond of recalling, endlessly, intimidatingly) and cooked for three days. The extended family’s extended family had gifts, and the house looked like a Sears catalog.
My mom continued that tradition and my dad ran with it – a tree that scraped the raised ceilings, extraordinarily elaborate and extensive gifts, and enough food to choke a horse.
My mom relished the Marshalls runs as much as my dad would spend hours on the phone with catalog orders. It was like a game for them to see who could overdo it more. We have Christmas ornaments the size of Aztec spheres and those fuckers needed to be hung from the mantelpiece which requires 3 to carry.
So when I reached the age of responsibility (still not sure if I’m there yet) I had big shoes to fill.
This would be the part where I’d tell everyone I learned some big lesson that the most important thing on Christmas is family and being together, and you don’t remember the gifts but the treasured memories with people.
And that bullshit’s all fine and dandy, but I still have gifts to buy, and I hope to god I don’t accidentally give grandma a heated blanket two years in a row.
pictured: the one year we gave up on the giant tree and brought out the tiny one