Day of Rest? At This Season?

Cleaning out my desk yesterday I came upon a year-old memo labeled Note to Self Regarding Holidays the first item of which reads "When it comes to seasonal decorations don’t bother hanging the mistletoe. Nobody ever got a kiss worth having based on a sprig of vegetation that two days in looks like a little dead bat." There's more too:

• When out shopping, focus on others, not yourself.
• This means no stopping to buy at that kiosk with the fake hair. Do you seriously want to come home after all that jostling with just a single gift because you spent all your time and money over a fistful of artificial ringlets? What are you, 12 and pretending to be the bride in your crystal-studded curls. Fake hair you do not need.
• Neither do you need frilly wares constructed from wee spans of satin and lace the size of cheese wedges.
• You may well need that famous new tea cozy of a garment, the sternum-to-kneecap Kevlar corset, but again try to remember this shopping effort is not for you.
• Sending a holiday card isn’t a thing you do for yourself either. Sure, you’ve heard people shouldn’t bother sending out cards unless it’s “fun” for them but that’s crazy talk. Most of the things we do are fun not fun and yet we do them. It’s practically the definition of adulthood.
• So write the darn cards and send them out, to every single person who sends one to you. Use the store-bought kind or make your own, either way.
• If you do make your own, throw in lots of pictures - everyone loves pictures – but for God's sake go easy on the long grey paragraphs of text. People are such wrecks these days they can hardly get their eyes to focus never mind wading through a 12-month blow-by-blow on you and your household pets.
• I write this last because I admit it: I’ve been guilty of producing way too much text in the holiday card, as well as carrying on about my own pets. And yet do I know very well how seldom I sit down and real every word of those newsy cards - until January rolls around, that is, at which point they seems so dear and fascinating I read every word and save them for the next six months. It isn’t rational, it’s the holidays. And who doesn’t feel the need to celebrate light and warmth in this months of the shortest days?

So I’ll say it again about contacting people whose life paths have crossed your own: do it. Just do it, whether you call, or write, or send an owl like Harry Potter’s friends at Hogwarts. Never make the mistake of thinking “oh, no one cares about me, no one will even notice if I don’t get in touch.” It is a lie spread by the old deceiver himself. We ALL care about you and require your presence in the circle, for you are the yarn and we are the sweater and we need every bright bit of fuzz we can find at this the lame pale tail-of-the-tail-end time of year.