It is that time of the year again: cotton wool snow; aluminium foil tinsel; electric bulbs that creep along shop facades, on little feet of blue, green and red; ragged trees; gaily-wrapped gift boxes of nothing and Santas of various shapes and sizes, uniform in their ill-fitting red suits and rather-be-elsewhere-expressions. Tinned music wafts out. The message could as well have been written on neon billboards. Folks, it is Christmas time. Open up your wallets and spread some cheer. In the manner of a much hated person from the world of fictitious characters, I’m willing to declare that Christmas is humbug.

And yet, this is also that time of the year when I bring out an old, dog-eared edition of Christmas tales, dust the patina of age that has settled on it and once again seek the spirit of the season in its pages.
In the distance I can hear singing. Hymns and carols. Music that seems to resound from the heavens through the nippy night. Some of the houses that line the street I live in boast of a star announcing the birth of the Christ child. It is a night for quiet contemplation and much pondering. Particularly as before me is a Christmas wish list from my son, Maitreya, who knows that the best way to get around me and into my pocket, is by making me laugh....

Things which I want:
PS3 + games
An electric guitar
Things which I have a small chance of getting:
A new pair of shoes, my choice (think Rs 5000 upwards)
All the Red Hot Chilli Peppers albums
Things which I get every Christmas irrespective of whether I want them or not:
A factory second T-shirt

Two books
It isn’t easy being a mother these days. On the one hand, my maternal instincts make me want to buy him every single thing on that list, never mind the starving millions, the homeless and the ill.
On the other hand, I would be failing in my maternal duties by giving too much and taking away forever from him the joy of receiving a much awaited gift. The promise of tomorrow: the not knowing, the hope, the surprise and the eventual elation that accompanies a gift long hungered for.
Even in a country like ours where the Christian population constitutes only 2.34 per cent, the resonance of Christmas pervades most homes. The TV romances it for us and we then let the momentum of the mood take over as paper chains are hung, trees bought and cakes baked.

Be it in fiction or real life, Christmas is that day when the knife turns in that wound of not having. Frank McCourt in his memoir, Angela’s Ashes, narrates the humiliations that become the ornament of each Christmas Day. One Christmas, it is ‘No goose, says the butcher, no ham. No fancy items.What you can have now Missus, is black pudding or tripe or a sheep’s head or a nice pig’s head’. In Sue Townsend’s Adrian Mole series, one Christmas Mole goes to the Kent residence and discovers ‘Mr Kent had been out in the community and found a large branch, painted it with white gloss paint and stuck it into the empty paint tin’. And Mrs Kent says sadly, “But it’s not the same really, not if the only reason you’ve got it is because you can’t afford to have a real plastic one.”

Unlike McCourt’s real trauma, Mrs Kent’s line makes you laugh until you realise that it could be the truth in several homes. That necessities take the place of frivolities. That the mundane has an aura of the extraordinary. And what could be dismissed as commonplace becomes the pinnacle of that day.
It is hard for me to disassociate myself from the books I read and the reality of life around me. And it is these I remember as I think of that rather beautiful (even if sentimental) story The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry. Perhaps the most poignant lines of that story lie in its first paragraph: ‘Three times Della counted it. One dollar and eighty seven cents. And the next day would be Christmas.’ And so when Della and Jim buy gifts for each other, you know that it has been requisitioned out of much soul searching and paid for with a sacrifice.
While Christmas may be a time to give, is excess allowed? Even if the recipient is one’s own child or a loved one…. I have to make a choice in the next few days.
Am I going to be a doting mother who will buy him a guitar he will twang and throw or a pair of expensive shoes his feet will outgrow in two months’ time or be a diligent parent who will eventually settle for the much maligned factory second T-shirt and two books?