In Which . . .
In which I talk to myself a lot, understand why the rest of the world hates us, and maybe I hate us, too.
The talking to myself: Next Monday I have to present an hour long program at a nursing home. I'm actually pretty excited about this. At first I was even laughing about it--like who's going to fall asleep first--them or me? But now I have to present it to our PR manager so she can make sure I don't publically humiliate myself or, more importantly, my employer. So how does one prepare for such an event?--you gotta talk to yourself--a lot. And you can't say gotta. Once tomorrow hits, I have a little over 48 hours. Gulp.
The understanding why the rest of the world hates us: My raw and cracked fingers explain it. The world hates us Americans because we are stupid. Why else would we buy a fake, pre-lit, 8 or 9ft tall Christmas tree for Jesus's birthday? Do Christmas trees even grow in Israel, and if they do, were they lit up and decorated while shepherds watched their flocks by night? (OK, maybe not all Americans are stupid, just the blonde one here at Big Bear--which is further evidence of American stupidity because I doubt a bear has ever been sighted in this neigborhood, unless it was about 150 years ago when it wasn't a neighborhood.) My hurting fingers are making me cranky I think.
So we have this fake tree, pre-lit. Last year the bulbs started going dark. So we changed dozens and dozens of bulbs. This year, more bulbs fizzled and faded. Big areas of darkness covered chunks of tree while other areas happily glowed and mocked us. Today as we were taking down the tree, I had the brilliant idea --let's just take off these old strings of lights and put new ones on next year when we put it back up! Yay!
Sixty minutes, aching backs, raw fingers, 30 feet of schizophrenic wiring, and a million cut ties and twinkle lights later, we have de-nuded the top third of the tree of it's lights. It's the smallest, easiest part.What's still standing is the size of a baby elephant. I don't expect our tree to be un-lighted and put away until June. yay.
The philosophical thing, tho, the thing that got Tom and I into this conversation about why the rest of the world hates Americans--which is putting it politically correctly--was the question Who put these lights on the tree in the first place? It was a piece of work! The branches were wrapped with strings of lights, I mean knotted and wrapped! And then tied or clipped! Not just the tips of the branches. No, no. The BRANCHES were WRAPPED! So somebody's little grandma or some sweatshops littlest child got in there, probably while it was spinning on a conveyor belt, and was getting poked and scratched and bleeding, raw fingers just so I could have a pre-lit nine foot fake tree for Jesus's birthday. It's not only stupid, it's ludicrous. I'm sorry, underpaid and abused workers of the world. I really didn't know what you went through to light my tree! And I'm sorry, Jesus, for getting sucked in by consumerism disguised as tradition and family values.
WRITING UPDATE: I've been super busy trying to get this talk together plus the widows blog, plus there's an interesting poetry event I could get involved in . . . But I'm yearning to get back to the book. It's just what widows need!
The talking to myself: Next Monday I have to present an hour long program at a nursing home. I'm actually pretty excited about this. At first I was even laughing about it--like who's going to fall asleep first--them or me? But now I have to present it to our PR manager so she can make sure I don't publically humiliate myself or, more importantly, my employer. So how does one prepare for such an event?--you gotta talk to yourself--a lot. And you can't say gotta. Once tomorrow hits, I have a little over 48 hours. Gulp.
The understanding why the rest of the world hates us: My raw and cracked fingers explain it. The world hates us Americans because we are stupid. Why else would we buy a fake, pre-lit, 8 or 9ft tall Christmas tree for Jesus's birthday? Do Christmas trees even grow in Israel, and if they do, were they lit up and decorated while shepherds watched their flocks by night? (OK, maybe not all Americans are stupid, just the blonde one here at Big Bear--which is further evidence of American stupidity because I doubt a bear has ever been sighted in this neigborhood, unless it was about 150 years ago when it wasn't a neighborhood.) My hurting fingers are making me cranky I think.
So we have this fake tree, pre-lit. Last year the bulbs started going dark. So we changed dozens and dozens of bulbs. This year, more bulbs fizzled and faded. Big areas of darkness covered chunks of tree while other areas happily glowed and mocked us. Today as we were taking down the tree, I had the brilliant idea --let's just take off these old strings of lights and put new ones on next year when we put it back up! Yay!
Sixty minutes, aching backs, raw fingers, 30 feet of schizophrenic wiring, and a million cut ties and twinkle lights later, we have de-nuded the top third of the tree of it's lights. It's the smallest, easiest part.What's still standing is the size of a baby elephant. I don't expect our tree to be un-lighted and put away until June. yay.
The philosophical thing, tho, the thing that got Tom and I into this conversation about why the rest of the world hates Americans--which is putting it politically correctly--was the question Who put these lights on the tree in the first place? It was a piece of work! The branches were wrapped with strings of lights, I mean knotted and wrapped! And then tied or clipped! Not just the tips of the branches. No, no. The BRANCHES were WRAPPED! So somebody's little grandma or some sweatshops littlest child got in there, probably while it was spinning on a conveyor belt, and was getting poked and scratched and bleeding, raw fingers just so I could have a pre-lit nine foot fake tree for Jesus's birthday. It's not only stupid, it's ludicrous. I'm sorry, underpaid and abused workers of the world. I really didn't know what you went through to light my tree! And I'm sorry, Jesus, for getting sucked in by consumerism disguised as tradition and family values.
WRITING UPDATE: I've been super busy trying to get this talk together plus the widows blog, plus there's an interesting poetry event I could get involved in . . . But I'm yearning to get back to the book. It's just what widows need!
Comments
Best of luck with your tree! Perhaps you should just add extra stringers to the already darkened, wrapped lights. I mean, if they're not shining, no one will notice them. Right?
Happy Wednesday to you!
-FringeGirl