Imperfection: The Perfect Gift To Give This Holiday Season
I’ve figured the perfect gift!
It’s perfect for–
Well, everybody.
That’s why I am now committing to a crummy holiday season.
Okay, maybe not the whole season,
But at least a couple of days.
A few failure moments.
You know me, Dear Reader.
I’m all about gratitude, being happy with what you have.
But a line is gets crossed this time of year.
To go on Facebook, to open your mailbox is to be deluged with perfection!
Everyone’s children are straight-A darlings who never so much as roll a single eyeball.
Everyone’s home is decorated with 22 Christmas trees and the 44 holiday cookies they made are from scratch. No Pillsbury Dough Boy shortcuts for them!
Everyone’s spouse is their best friend who picked out the perfect gift.
In a word, “Puh-lease.”
It’s enough to make a relatively happy person gag and wonder why my holidays aren’t all that.
And then, there are the folks I’m really hurting for.
I have family and friends, acquaintances, who are having a hard time this year.
First year without a loved one.
Tough financial times.
I have one friend who is still watching the ink dry on her divorce papers.
“Facebook,” she gulped to me the other day as we dunked our feet in pedicure tubs trying to wash our troubles away. “I, pictures, happy, everyone, cry…”
She couldn’t put the words together in a sentence, but I knew what she meant.
Sharing your fake perfect happiness is making someone else miserable.
Can we just for one day be honest?
After all, even if things are pretty good for this year, you know you’ve been in a place where they have not.
So how about the gift everyone can love?
The gift of imperfection.
One friend was a great Imperfection Gift Giver describing her Thanksgiving on Facebook.
“Fights over who would make the place cards for the table, tears over forts destroyed by mischievous little brothers and a little over the top tween dramatics to keep it interesting. No doubt, that’s exactly how the first Thanksgiving was spent.”
You know I clicked a “Like” button on that one!
I can add that I managed to overcook the pre-cooked turkey I bought for our Thanksgiving.
If you need it I can provide a list of at least 18 family and friends who we are disappointing by not seeing them this holiday season.
Decorations? I only put away the Thanksgiving decorations (two stuffed animal turkeys) last week.
There is a Christmas tree in the corner of our living room. Bare nekkid, as we like to say here in the South. Haven’t had a moment yet to untangle the lights or hang ornaments.
And Bad Mommy probably won’t light the menorah all eight nights of Hannukah. Talk about an equal opportunity screw up.
If this is truly your crummiest holiday season ever, the good news is future holidays can be a lot better.
And when they are, it’ll be your turn to share that hope, that things can get better, just make sure you keep it real.
Better isn’t perfect.
But imperfection will always be the perfect gift.
Find more uplifting stories on my website, DarynKagan.com
Please catch my newspaper column each week in the Atlanta Journal Constitution, the Dayton Daily News and other newspapers across Ohio.
