The UPS man has replaced the Magi

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    Honk if you love giving gifts. No, not making lists and going shopping for them, just giving them. I suppose we have the three Magi to thank for this ritual. Calling the relatives. What are you getting for Uncle Joseph? What size is Mary’s little boy? Gold, frankincense and myrrh, whatever that is. I mean, how did those wise men decide these were suitable gifts for an infant, in a manger, no less. Swaddling clothes, maybe. No need to check the size. But how could they carry gold riding a donkey all the way back to Nazareth?

    Who cares, it’s the thought that counts. Right? Wrong. Everybody’s closets are stacked with unwanted gifts from last year. Ugly ties, Christmas sweaters, fuzzy slippers. These were not chosen in the cool light of morning over a cup of coffee. They were snagged from a sale table at Macy’s the day before Christmas Eve. Desperation time.

    After snubbing invitations to Christmas Eve dinner for years, Uncle Fred decides at the last minute to accept. And there’s no gift for him.

    This year, we started early with the plethora of catalogs mailed to us in spite of postal paranoia over anthrax. We turn their glossy pages until the colors blur. “Ooh. Wouldn’t that be nice to have?” I vowed years ago that if you say that about something, you don’t need it. You won’t like it when you see it in person and you for sure will resent it when you get the bill.

    Nevertheless, we dog-ear pages, make lists, compare lists, cross out names. Basically, we get crazy. Then everyone starts calling and saying they don’t have any money this year and we should consolidate gift giving and just give one gift per couple “from all of us.” Try selling that to a 7-year-old who has made his own wish list and usually has at least a dozen boxes to open Christmas morning.

    The 7-year-old’s list is fairly short but everything on it is three-figures. Play Station 2 got scratched out early on. Likewise, the electric guitar. I told him when he learns to play the acoustic guitar Santa brought last year we might consider amplification. But the final, final, final list still has a drum set, a baseball (one that miraculously clocks the speed at which it’s thrown), a Virtual Reality snowboard simulator, a game for the old Play Station and a box of puzzles.

    By the time we decide what we’re getting each person and who’s paying for it and we start calling Hammacher Schlemmer, Plow and Hearth, Real Goods and Back to Basic Toys, half the stuff we want is sold out, back- ordered, no way, Jose, by Christmas.

    Meanwhile, I’ve ordered things for my daughter, my son-in-law and things for the house, before the austerity agreement was broached. They are arriving daily and must be given early or stashed until after the holidays but definitely not wrapped and beribboned and placed under the tree. So I’ve saved only one gift for each adult so as not to have the whole thing lopsided or one-sided or cause anguish or embarrassment because, “We said we weren’t going to give a lot of stuff this year.”

    But, you guys, this is my big fun for the year. I love getting all these things for everyone. And since I didn’t dare make a list of what I want, I made sneak orders for myself. Now when the UPS truck drives up the driveway, practically every afternoon, I race out to retrieve the parcels, lest someone see what I’ve done.

    Hidden in my room are a Qi Gong video, a ceramic compost crock, a chenille throw, down slippers and, my fave, a retro portable phonograph player from Restoration Hardware, just like the one I had in high school. Why would anyone want that, you ask, when everything worth having has been remastered or reissued on CD? Well, that may be true, to a point. Most of my old jazz records–Oscar Peterson, Ahmad Jamal, Barney Kessel, George Shearing–are available on CD. But I have a huge collection on vinyl of obscure film scores that I haven’t been able to listen to since my old stereo went south. Trouble is, now I have to wait until after Christmas to hear them.

    Most of the kids’ things have already arrived, even some that we were warned might be back ordered. The 2-year-old has books, a hand-beaded Levi jacket, and the baby girl who is expected to appear sometime before February has just about everything she needs. Well, no swaddling clothes.

    The drum set hasn’t come yet. Not that I’m looking forward to all that racket. But it’s only fair that after trimming his list, the little guy gets the few things left on it. The suspense is killing me. Whatever happened to gold, frankincense and myrrh?