Thursday, December 3: Femme Fatale
DROWNING IN CATALOGS
by Deborah Elliott-Upton
The holiday season has always been a time of overflowing mailboxes filled with catalogs. Though postal costs have risen, catalogs are still arriving at the mere hint of a chance for retailers to make money the old fashioned way: through December sales. As a child, I awaited the Sears catalog, renamed somewhere in time as The Wish Book the most. Actually, that didn’t end when I stopped being a child, but then perhaps we all have childlike tendencies at times. Mom let us mark up The Wish Book with circles of a crayon denoting what we wanted for Christmas. Each person in our family was provided a special color so everyone knew what everyone else wanted. There were no rules, no limits, no boundaries. More than one person could circle a gift from The Wish Book because the wishes were all free.
My choice changed from red to midnight blue to violet colors over the years and my circles weren’t perfect, but they were always bold. I didn’t believe in wasting crayons by not being able to see them on the page. My sister always chose pink and colored more delicately than me. I always wondered if Mom actually saw all the things circled in such a pale color. I wasn’t about to take that chance.
When my husband asked me what I wanted this year for Christmas, I leaned back and said, “I don’t know. There’s no Sears catalog to wish on.”
I don’t need a new computer, camera, or flat-screen TV. I don’t need another pair of slippers or pajamas or cooking utensil. Years ago, I decreed to everyone: Don’t buy me anything I might have to dust. I have plenty of those already.
So, what do I want? Aha, that is another matter. I want books. What reader ever has enough books? Of course, my husband thinks we already have too many books. (I can just hear Dick Stodghill muttering away, “That clod! Books are wonderful gifts!”)
Both of them would be correct. (Not about my darling husband being a clod though! ? He’s really a very nice guy.)
We have enough books in our home to start a mobile library. I have two floor-to-ceiling bookshelves of children’s books still in my son’s old room and more boxed-up in the attic. My son is in the Army. I don’t think he’s going to be reading Charlotte’s Web or Treasure Island again any time soon. But maybe someone will. They are classics. And besides, I have ideas about grandbabies dancing in my head since my daughter married in May.
But, books are wonderful gifts. I should share my riches.
Isn’t that what writers do with their stories anyway? Share their thoughts, their stories, their dreams?
I may be drowning in catalogs, but they aren’t the ones wishes are made from or treasured by someone who hasn’t been told it would be impossible not to dream about owning everything you ever wanted.
I don’t have the Sears catalog, but I do have a wealth of dreams, both mine and other writers willing to share. Aren’t we blessed to be able to read? I think that is perhaps the best wish in the world, for everyone to be able to read. To dream with abandon and to help someone else reap just a little bit more than they had wished.
This brought back some wonderful memories! My sisters and I loved The Wish Book. We would yank it back and forth, arguing over who got it next. I’m surprised we never pulled the thing apart!! It was as much a part of the holidays as the tree and the turkey!
I wish for more fond memories and friends like you. Sadly neither come in a catalog, but as a postal worker I get my fill of those anyway.
Loved some small novelty catalog my folks got regularly when I was a kid. Got them to order a sausage sized pen that wrote in multiple colors. (I may still have that thing soimewhere!) Your column is perfect holiday reading! (And, I re-read “Dr. Seuss’ Sleep Book” a few months ago. Loved it!)
My kid is a grad student in Massachusetts but we kept a shelf and a half of her children’s books. they come in handy when people bring kids over. And I recently noticed the copy of D’Aulaire’s Greek Myths that I bought her twenty years ago is falling apart. So I bought a new copy for myself.
And I recently noticed the copy of D’Aulaire’s Greek Myths that I bought her twenty years ago is falling apart. So I bought a new copy for myself.
One of my favorite books of all time. I did the same thing—buying a new copy for myself—about a decade ago.
Most of my books came from my mother’s childhood. She kept them neat and organized so very little damage ever befell them. I still pull them out from time to time and read.