Friday, November 26, 2010

Rule One: Get a Life

The emergence of the cultural phenomenon called Black Friday demonstrates unequivocally how we've lost the "Big Picture" of living. Commercialization of holidays has accelerated over the years with the seasonal shifting of "must have" merchandise displays seemingly on a carousel. Minimalist acknowledgements of special relationships have been developed into orgies of spending and message-sending. Mother's Day, Father's Day, Secretary's Day, Bosses Day, Halloween, Christmas...ooops, "Holiday Season", all require a spree of conspicuous consumption for the cheapest, most inane, temporary gratification junk we can find at the mall.

Black Friday is today. It's a day supposedly of incredible bargains which will only be offered at incredibly inconvenient times and with only a limited supply but which we simply must get for our "Winter Holiday Celebration" (aka Christmas). This provides justification for people getting really stupid and leaving their comfortable homes to stand in the pre-dawn cold waiting for doors to open so they can demonstrate their compassion and caring by elbowing and clawing their way over the supine bodies of those who couldn't handle the crush to get the special price on a 19" LCD TV with built in Blu-Ray player for their kitchen counter at just $179 (after rebate.)

The required showtime for this savagery is continually upped to make it more exciting. It was 8:00 AM then 6, then 4 and now three o'clock in the bloody morning! All of this was apparently greeted enthusiastically by the mouth-breathing hordes of modern America.

But this year they went too far! Yes, if you try to introduce a change too rapidly, you will get resistance. Some boorish retailers announced that they were going to be...drum roll, please...open on Thanksgiving Day! Outrage! Sacrilege! Blasphemy! Un-American!

They have desecrated a sacred tradition. Have they no regard for family? How evil! Pass a law requiring them to stay closed! Boycott them! Burn them at the stake!

Free the indentured retail workers! Liberty for Sears employees! Storm the Bastille!

Get a life, folks! I figured it out a long time ago. I was in Europe in a fighter squadron. There was a reason we were there and it wasn't for holidays and family. It was to wield a mighty sword on demand 24/7/365. That required a lot of TDY (temporary duty) or time away from the home fires. We spent one month out of three in Turkey and during the two months at home in Spain, we spent one month of that with some crews deployed to Italy. Our task was to sleep with "The Bomb", ready to deliver instant sunshine to the nasty parts of the world if required.

We tried to balance the load. Everyone had a share, but when you were in a supervisory role you tried to consider families with kids and look a bit for volunteers who might not mind being away for the holiday.

That's when I figured it out. A holiday is a time for family and friends and traditions. It isn't a date and time on a calendar. It is the day when you can be there and you can do the things which make the celebration special. The time for Thanksgiving is when you can set it aside and it might not be the fourth Thursday of November this year. Christmas is the day you exchange tokens of your affection with family and friends and recall what it all means in the greater scheme of things. It might not be on December 25th in your house, but it is just as special.

If a store wishes to be open on Thanksgiving Day, they get the choice in a free market. If a person wishes to take the day to shop they can do so if they chose. If an individual wishes to stay home whether in reaction to the store's opening or simply to enjoy the holiday they have that right. What other people chose to do has not a thing to do with my family, my life and my enjoyment of them both.

Get a life.

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