The nearer it gets to Christmas the more I want to remain in our house and not go anywhere near a store that celebrates the birth of Jesus by selling things I do not need.  The commercial atmosphere at this time of the year is stifling.  I also find that the nearer it gets to Christmas the sooner 2003 is over and we then are obligated to celebrate the birth of 2004. There are so many people involved in industries that first want me to buy things and then want me to go to this or that restaurant to feast and become silly with drink.

The hysteria to participate in and then to achieve an end to celebration is evident on the highways where traffic has increased – especially here in Florida where northern refugees have come to seek our sun and warmth.  I am sorry to announce to those still planning to come down that we are in the middle of an extended cold spell and sweaters and jackets are in order.  We Floridians follow the snow, ice and freezing temperatures in more northern climes avidly, thinking logically that we are better off in our sweaters than those who have to bundle up against swirling snow, icy sidewalks and old snow drifts still hugging the edges of the roadway. Age softens my missing the opportunity to put on cross-country skies and find benefit in the snow that used to bedevil us in New Jersey.

The nearer it gets to Christmas the more I wonder WWJD if he were here to witness the witless scurrying of humans to do the bidding of advertisers, merchandisers and retailers to get you into their clutches and then to send you home sans money, sans enjoyment and sans time to enjoy this season of merriment. I always thought that family getting together from distant places and sitting down to meals together to celebrate sanguinity and sanity was the point of this season.  I have found that we are all the victims of others who claim that the Gross National Product must always go up at this point in the year so that our merchants have a good season to make the greater part of their profits by you and me forking over our wealth to them. It seems to them to be the right thing for us to do.

I do appreciate the need for snowbirds to arrive in our vicinity and welcome the opportunity to see, meet and mingle with them over meals in our fine Florida restaurants.  This year the weather has not cooperated.  Those who have come to sample our sands, beaches, pools and access to roads choked with cars are sure to be disappointed. Unlike bedeviled fire ants trying to escape the sprays and poisons they have come to expect, the northern visitors come in droves to enjoy the pleasures once fabled here in the southernmost state of our up-for-sale union. I sympathize with Scrooge and the Grinch.