December Newsletter : Tied Up with String
Enough Already?
II bought a second hand book in Oamaru a week ago. After I paid for it, the shopkeeper wrapped it in brown paper, tied it with string and stamped it with the firm’s name and logo.
On one level this was a deeply twee event. The setting was the historic whitestone quarter of Oamaru where people walk about dressed in Victorian costumes and “steampunks” bury their heads in dangerous and complex machines.
Behind the bookshop counter which looked impressively old and quaint, there was actually a computer and EFT-POS terminal tastefully hidden away.
On another level it was a little ironic. The book I bought was called The Natural History of the Rich: a field guide, written by National Geographic contributor Richard Connif in 2004.
It appears from his book that whatever else the rich might do to proclaim their alpha status, treating the purchase of a cheap second hand book as a special event is not one of them.
But in that small act of wrapping, tying and stamping lay a clear rejection of modern acts of consumerism. By celebrating my purchase with this ritual, the shopkeeper was making a statement that this one small purchase was important and ENOUGH.
By comparison, we in the real world usually shovel more and more and more things into our lives with little ceremony at all. Unless it's really, really expensive.
Of course, though I appreciated her intention, it wasn’t ACTUALLY enough – in other stores I went on to buy a handmade hat, some freshly picked strawberries, hand crafted goats milk soap and a 550 million year old trilobite.
All very reasonably priced.
How Good is Post-materialism?
There’s a part-time English vicar on TV at the moment who’s exploring frugality. He’s attempting to live without money – in the manner of St F of Assisi – initially by growing his own food and bartering his work.
But now, he has been advised by a Franciscan monk that even self-sufficiency is an act of selfish egotism and that true selfless frugality comes from relying on God to provide.
So he has taken to the highways, dressed in his cassock, prepared to sleep rough and beg for food. Watched over only by God and a BBC film crew.
His first attempt to beg for food was from a woman emerging from a supermarket. I had quite a strong visceral response to that. I heard him ask her the question then quickly switched off the programme before I heard her reply.
So embarrassed for them – especially her. I know what I’d have said if I didn't know I was being filmed.
Not sure how knowledge of the filming would have changed things but I think it would. Perhaps she did say something she can live with. After all she’s still on the film.
In the interests of this newsletter I may go back and find out what happened, but really I couldn’t watch. It is so deeply ingrained in me that you must first try to take care of yourself, that I found it hard to think of any context other than extreme incapacity in which begging can be seen as a good thing.
The Franciscan had some glib justification about the goodness involved in allowing other people to be generous, but then he would say that wouldn’t he?
Frankly I think this may be one of those times where you wonder out loud what would happen if we all behaved that way.
Have a Meaningful Christmas!
Christmas is a time when the social norms of consumption receive sharper and sharper scrutiny - even as this day of traditional gluttony and excess struggles to differentiate itself from every other day of gluttony and excess.
I think there's severe brand confusion here! I think that Boxing Day has actually established itself as the most meaningful day of the year for consumption – because it most clearly encompasses the post-recession value of discount seeking. That’s an impressive effort when every day is now discount day.
Boxing Day’s other triumphant brand attribute is “personalisation”. Vouchers may not have any magic to them but god they're useful. Especially in a "want what I want, not what you think I want" long-tail society.
Christmas still ‘owns’ food and feasting, of course, but that’s a fairly saturated marketplace as well. How long before we replace it with Matariki as a genuine mid-winter feast celebrating New Zealand’s locally grown produce? Or KFC proclaims every day is Christmas Day?
So if you are feeling a little underwhelmed by the thought of all that logistical effort for just another day of eating drinking and opening parcels, there’s several ways you can increase the meaningfulness of Christmas.
One popular alternative is just to amp it up!
Especially if you have children. Maintain the illusion of specialness by going all-out. If Santa won't make a personal appearance, take your kids to Lapland on Xmas Eve to see him [it can be done].
And don't worry how expensive your child's wish list is - preserve the illusion that Santa really reads it and get them what they asked for. Laptop . pony . . etc
If you go this way, the one essential item you will need is a self-justifying story. As gifts to children become more and more excessive we have to find even more excessive stories to bring perspective to our own much smaller sins of consumption.
Just a note that if you haven't found any - beware. You're probably the subject of them.
Or why not back off of the consumption angle altogether and re-position Christmas as a celebration of meaning.
We are urged now to make homespun presents - to do marvellous things with wool and feathers, knock up a few little woodwork projects for our loved ones or turn out a batch of exotic titbits. So much less meaningless.
Meaning is also achieved by giving gifts to strangers [who don't have accompanying film crews and really are needy]. World Vision has made it even easier to buy goats and water purification tablets for people who may not have Christmas or The Warehouse or even the $2 Shop.
As a Christian organisation I assume WV has mentioned Xmas to them. I wonder what they said? When you have got not much, no doubt the idea of feasting and presents makes quite a selling point.
Finally, perhaps you can re-design Christmas to meet your own needs.
In my own personal quest for meaning I’ve made Christmas into a celebration of multi-disc DVDs. No naps after Christmas lunch for me! I hoard them till the magic day then let loose an orgy of viewership that may last days!.
It began in 2000 with Lord of the Rings – 12 hours including the Special Features I think. Last year it was the boxed set of The Wire – 5 series = 2 weeks in Baltimore. This year - not sure yet. Plenty of time to decide.
The only downside is that the technology is being replaced by downloads. There’s just not the drama in a downloading. So if I have one Christmas wish it's this: please don’t make disks obsolete before the full Harry Potter series is compiled. It would be such a waste.
Yes Virginia, sadly things do change even when we don’t want them to. But imagine how the turkey felt. Things had been going so well for him lately. So much yummy food, so much care and attention.
Have a great Christmas and work on that happy New Year.
Cheers
Jill
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Jill Caldwell is Director of Windshift Ltd. Click Here to contact Jill directly This is a free monthly newsletter provided to direct subscribers and legitimate Windshift contacts only. No further use is made of subscriber information. [Copyright Windshift Ltd 2006]
"Christmas is a time when the social norms of consumption receive sharper and sharper scrutiny - even as this day of traditional gluttony and excess struggles to differentiate itself from every other day of gluttony and excess. . . "
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