Suzanne presents Curtiss Ann Matlock

Curtiss Ann Matlock wishes all of us a Christmas State of Mind

"Christmas, children, is not a date. It is a state of mind." --- Mary Ellen Chase, writer and teacher.

My husband, Jim, and I decided to go Christmas shopping the first Saturday of December, which illustrates our state of mind as being, well, a little out of our minds.

To fully illustrate the point, it should be understood that we are basically hermits. We like breathing our own air, and where we live, we have plenty of it— forty acres of quiet paradise fifteen miles from the nearest grocery store, over a mile from any paved road, a quarter-mile from the nearest neighbor, with deer in the pasture most mornings. We can count on one hand the number of times we go shopping. We Internet shop, and are on first name basis with the postman, FedEx and UPS drivers.

Changes, however, have been growing upon us. The big house echoes with just our voices, and with realities of Jim’s looming retirement and the prospect of Christmas morning alone. No traveling to grandma’s house, no visiting siblings. And it is the first Christmas in nearly thirty years without our beloved only child, who this year moved nine-hundred miles away, knee-deep in new job, new house, and preparing for his own new child.

The wreath isn’t hung on the door right after Thanksgiving, and I realized there will be no need for the stocking that has hung for twenty-eight years— not only that, I do not have the stocking, because I gave it to him last year. I’m not baking, because Jim and I have dietary restrictions. We have been saying things like: "Maybe I’ll skip sending out Christmas cards this year." "Let’s get an artificial tree. It’s time." "Let’s not get each other gifts, we have everything." Things are different. We’re in a funk.

Then, suddenly, with no thought, I said, "Let’s go shopping," and Jim said, "Okay."

The interstate highway is wall-to-wall, the exit ramp backed up. The parking lots at all the fast food places resemble the toy road rally sets, people racing in and out. At the entry to the lot of a strip mall, there has just been a wreck. We are in time to see a woman get out of one of the cars and stomp over to yell at the driver of the other car. Down at the holiday shop, though, we are pleasantly surprised to discover the crowd light. Why? Because everyone else has bought their holiday decorations, and pickings are thin. Still, we agree it is time to dispense with all the mess of a ceiling-high, imported from the north Douglas Fir. Actually, Jim has suggested it, and I have agreed to consider.

Jim eyes the artificial offerings, especially the fiber-optic one. Only five feet tall, just plug it in. The plastic needles glow. What about the shiny aluminum trees? Remember them? They’re back. I hated them in the sixties, but now my view is soft with nostalgia. We go round and round the display, calling, "Look! Come see!"

In the end, though, "Oh, honey...just one more year." So it is agreed. It will be the live tree farm again this year. I promise to choose one half— no, two thirds— as tall as usual, and Jim will haul it home, saw off the bottom branches and stick it in water. To celebrate this decision I reach for a shiny silver and red glass Victorian bauble, and Jim picks up all new light strings.

Then there is the Wal-mart, which in our neck of the woods is just about all there is. We may have come to the city, but we are not doing the mall. There is no air at the mall.

The Wal-mart parking lot is, well, what did we expect? The driver ahead of us is waiting on a close-in space and blocking traffic all the way out into the street. Restraining from ramming him out of the way, Jim maneuvers around; we see the driver is still waiting when we walk, hand in hand and smug with our good sense, into the store.

My word. A barrage of light and sound assault us, and smugness vanishes. The crowd is such that many a time I am sucking in my gut to squeeze through, and maneuvering the cart like a moonshiner around roadblocks. Other shoppers are doing the same. It is step out of the way, or be run down in every single isle. "No, you cannot take off your coat, you are not hot!" a passing woman screams at her son in such a way that I straighten my own coat. Shelves are in disarray, or simply empty. I open three cartons of my favorite eggs, looking for one without broken shells. And everyone breathing up my air!

So this is Christmas, John Lennon sings in my head.

But then—

I am forced to step aside near the meat freezers for a stream of people going in the opposite direction. My eyes meet those of a scruffy, tough-looking man in a black stocking cap and lined face. Suddenly there is that mystical connection without words. The man and I grin at each other.

His eyes truly twinkle— Santa Claus eyes— and as he passes me, he murmurs, "Merry Christmas."

It was my first Merry Christmas wish.

Things seems to look a little different. I went over to the music department, am nearly rundown and take my life in my hands to ask a passing clerk laden with boxes, "Where are the Christmas music CDs?" He answers, "I’ll show you," rather than simply pointing. Along our way a lady stops him, and he calmly says he will help her in a minute, then leads me directly to the music.

Beside me a teenage girl with an earring in her nose picks up the The Mormon Tabernacle Choir, of all things.

A young woman calls, "Mom...here is one!" It is three generations of women shopping together. They are smiling and having a time.

A young father waits by the ladies rest room, with three children in a cart. He hitches up his fashionably baggy jeans and carefully places a blanket over the baby carrier, then pokes his head down beneath the cover to speak and smile at the baby.

I find the paper corner cutter I wanted! And Christmas stickers! Jim finds the perfect container to hold his paintbrushes. And a table-top fiber-optic tree.

The woman ahead of us at checkout strikes up conversation: "I don’t usually come to Wal-mart on Saturday."

"We don’t either, but we were feeling wild and daring." We all chuckle and share shopping stories.

All the way home, I think about that tough-looking man with the Santa Claus eyes. I think about our exchange while I unpack our purchases, and while I pull out my annual Christmas cup in which to have tea, and slice a piece of Christmas fruitcake, with the very red candy cherries. I think about it as I see that we had bought one gift for someone on our list, and every other thing had been for Jim and myself. And they were all toys.

Yes, this is Christmas.

It is a state of mind, and one bound only by the act of choosing to have it.

I get up and clean off the mantle, then dig out our stocking hangers and Jim’s and my stockings. I put them in place for the first time. Hey, kids still live here.

Wishing you all a Christmas state of mind!
Curtiss Ann

Inquiring Minds want to know, of course, what will you do to put yourself in a Christmas state of mind?

P.S. To learn more about Curtiss Ann's lovely and heartfelt books, please visit her web site at www.curtissannmatlock.com.