Column

Searching through the Christmas lost and found

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The kitchen becomes my primary place of residence the week before Thanksgiving and continues straight on through New Year’s Day. I should probably file a change-of-address card with the Post Office.

The kitchen counter is littered with crumpled dish towels, soiled hot pads and towering stacks of dirty cookie sheets and mixing bowls.

Pots bubbling on the stove have all been seasoned with two shakes of harried and a dash of exhaustion. Cold dirty dishwater in the sink formed a film an hour ago.

I’m looking for something, but I’m having difficulty finding it. It’s not in the kitchen, that’s for sure.

A top-to-bottom search of the family room turns up empty as well. It isn’t dangling from any of the Christmas tree branches. It isn’t wedged between Christmas sheet music in the piano bench or buried beneath the sofa cushions—although I do find a sock, some caramel popcorn and two candy cane wrappers.

I shake a few gifts under the tree and hold them to my ear when nobody is looking. Pretty, but not what I’m looking for.

As the hunt continues, I’m feeling frustrated and flushed. I can’t be the only one who thinks it’s hot in here. I throw open a window and a blast of cold rushes in. The night sky is plastered with diamonds. The constellations are singing and surely the earth is trembling. The magnificence of such beauty is overwhelming. This is what I have been searching for – wonder.

It is the jaw-dropping wonder of a night long ago. The wonder of a peasant couple taking refuge in a manger. The wonder of a young girl giving birth to the King of Kings on a stable floor strewn with straw and air filled with the stench of animal waste. It is the wonder of God stooping low, taking on humble human form.

This newborn baby, fresh from His mother’s womb, cradled in her arms and feeding at her breast, would be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

He also would be called the Good Shepherd, Redeemer, Savior, Friend of Sinners.

So many powerful names gracing one tiny baby. It is beyond the scope of imagination.

The wonder of Christmas is not in fabulous meals, piles of gifts, or dazzling decorations. It’s not in parties and festivities or the serenade of Dickens carolers.

The wonder of Christmas is found in the sacred moments of a still and quiet heart. I wish you wonder this Christmas season.

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Think twice before you cancel Christmas

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The following column was first published in December 2000. Last year, two days before Christmas, Scott from Illinois mailed a copy of the column to me. He said the piece had meant a lot to him when he read it 23 years ago. He has shared it with others in hard places and thought I should share it again because someone might need it. So, here it is.

As of this posting, it is uncertain if Bethlehem will be celebrating Christmas this year, 2024.

Think Twice Before You Cancel Christmas
Lori Borgman

They’ve canceled Christmas in Bethlehem.

The Christmas tree in Manger Square stands bare and unadorned. There will be no candlelit walks to the manger, no festive Christmas concert.

The Royal City of David, normally packed with tourists and pilgrims, is deserted. Had Mary and Joseph been traveling this season, they would have found plenty of room at the inn. They wouldn’t have a prayer of getting anywhere close to the manger, though. Armed police guard the Church of the Nativity that shelters the tiny stable where Christ was born.

There won’t be any aerial camera shots of the streets of Bethlehem on the 11 o’clock news come Christmas Eve. No mellow voice over proclaiming, “Peace on earth, good will toward men.” For weeks, Bethlehem has been the site of violence, mayhem and destruction, which is why Christmas has been canceled.

You say you’ve canceled Christmas, too—not in Bethlehem, but in your heart. You’ve suffered your own mayhem and destruction. You’ve had your fill of Silent Night. For weeks, the nights have been so silent and long you could hear mice snoring three states away.

This is for everyone outside of the Holy Land who is contemplating canceling Christmas.

Maybe you’re exhausted from caring for a sick family member. Maybe you’re weary and frustrated from fighting your way back from an illness or injury. Maybe this was the year you enlarged your vocabulary with words like malignancy, stem cells and bone marrow.

Maybe your marriage feels like it’s gone flatline. You’re wondering what attracted you to each other in the first place.

Maybe it’s been months since you spoke to a certain friend or family member who betrayed you. If you saw them tomorrow, you’d just as soon pelt them with fruitcakes as to utter a civil “hello.”

Maybe you’ve been devastated by divorce. Maybe you fought a knockdown drag out custody battle over the kids and then went a second round over worthless junk like silverware and power tools.

Maybe, like scores of people in Bethlehem, you are grieving the loss of a loved one this year. Maybe the holiday reds and greens are colorless because the lens you see through is dirty dishwater gray.

Think twice before you cancel Christmas.

That baby in the manger didn’t come to make sure that retailers had a robust season at the cash register. Nor did he come to put frost on our windows and pink in our cheeks. Christ didn’t come to create a picture-perfect Currier and Ives memory.

Christ came for three dimensional people—people with thin skin, blind spots and pent up anger. He came for people who hurt and suffer and struggle. He came for people who get depressed at holiday time. He came for those who have everything but feel empty inside and are scared to admit it. He came for human beings who mangle relationships and turn priorities upside down.

The essence of Christmas is that God sent his Son, not to punish or condemn mankind, but to offer a helping hand. Christ was sent for every man, woman and child who can admit they’re less than perfect and need the help of someone who is.

Some say when people open their heart to Christmas, the Son of God works wonders. He eases the pain and suffering. Some say He’s been known to yank the knot right out of a chain. Others say He has gently dried tears, softened hearts and sat beside them in the dark. Still others claim, when they have opened their hearts, that He has showered them with priceless gifts—treasures like faith, hope and love.

Think twice before you cancel Christmas. This may be the year you need it most.

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Hard to Buy For people make the naughty list

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We have officially entered the “Hard to Buy For” season of life. I am reminded of this every time someone asks me what we’d like for Christmas. No one has said we are hard to buy for in so many words—it’s more the looks—the eye rolls, the raised eyebrows, the barely suppressed expressions of shock and horror.

“We like those little books of car wash tickets,” I say.

“Mother, I thought we agreed a car wash is not a gift.”

There was no agreement on anything. Someone just announced that a car wash is not a very exciting gift and BAM! there went the free car washes.

“We like gift cards,” I say. No, make that “love” gift cards.

We must love them because our wallets are fat with them. I have a gift card so old that the theater it was for has closed. I keep the gift card because it is a sweet memory of the person who gave it.


Judging from her face, she is not enthused about the gift card suggestion.

“We give big box hardware store gift cards to your husband, your sister’s husband, and your brother, and they all like them.”

“Yes, but when we give you gift cards you use them to buy things for others.”

“What can I say? We like treating.”

Silence.

“I could use a new bundt pan,” I say.

“We just gave you a new bundt pan when you said you needed one a few years ago.”

“You have me mixed up with someone else because my bundt pan is quite possibly a health hazard. The last coffee cake tasted like Teflon.”

She’s still not writing anything down.

“How about trash bags?” I suggest.

No response.

“Batteries? We can always use batteries.”

“You’re fun people, aren’t you?” she says.

“We try,” I say. “Stamps! We’d like stamps.”

“Stamps are not a gift.”

You’re right,” I say. “With the last price hike, they’re a luxury item.”

It’s not like we didn’t see this coming. The Hard to Buy For season of life was bound for a head-on collision with the Getting Rid of Things season of life.

“What about Dad?” she asks. “How about a shirt?”

“I’ve got a shirt!” he yells from the kitchen. “I have so many shirts, I could wear three at a time and not run out for a month.”

You know what I’d really like?” he says.

“What?” she asks, with a surge of hope.

“A new bundt pan!”

She’s looking despondent now.

I put my arm around her and say, “You know what we always say – your presence is our present.”

The poor thing looks depleted and utterly exhausted. We do that to people. So do the holidays.

“Let’s go get a coffee,” I say. “I’ll treat. I’ve got a gift card.”

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Screen tests aren’t just for movie stars

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I had an identity crisis yesterday. It was the fourth one this week. Online accounts keep questioning if it’s really me.

I have the same thought a lot of mornings when I look in the mirror.

The bank insisted I confirm my identity before I could access our account—all because I made one teeny tiny typo entering the passcode. Flustered and in a hurry, but not one to ever make the same mistake twice, I made a different typo on my next try. I was automatically routed to the 3-question “How Good is Your Memory?” game.

Where did you and your spouse first meet?

What was your favorite pureed vegetable as an infant?

What was your great, great, great maternal grandfather’s blood type?

I failed that, too. I guess carrots was the wrong answer.


I had to go to the bank in person to unfreeze the account. The teller asked if I had any additional identification. Just so you know, the bank will not accept an appendectomy scar from when you were a child as additional identification.

The verification requests that I don’t mind are the ones that ask me to enter a code sent by text or email. I like these. They are good memory tests to see if I can flip between screens and still remember a six-digit number. So far, so good.

The Walmart app recently asked me to verify my identity when I arrived for a grocery pickup order. Seriously? There are 32 pickup spots in the parking lot and I was the only single solitary car out there. It was 7 a.m and still dark. Yes, it’s me. Now please bring out the milk and laundry detergent.

Of course, there’s always facial recognition identification that simplifies logging in, but do I want to go down that road? What if I have a good night’s sleep (unlikely), the bags under my eyes disappear (virtually impossible), and the app can’t recognize me?

What if I decide to have plastic surgery, have everything on my face pulled, tightened, puffed and fluffed, and wind up looking so young that the app doesn’t recognize me? That is also highly unlikely, but a woman of a certain age likes to keep her options open.

The only thing I know for sure is that I always experience a wave of panic whenever I see the message: “Failed to verify your identity.”

The upside of all this identify verification business is that the CAPTCHA security checks that once required you click on the all the boxes with power lines, bicycles or traffic lights, now simply ask you to check the “I am not a robot” box. As improved as that is, I still believe that CAPTCHA should be renamed GOTCHA.

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Take a number to use the landline

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Three of our elementary-school grands have a new landline phone sitting in their family room. They called us multiple times the first week it was installed, each time saying, “Hello, Watson?”

No, they didn’t. Each time a soft voice cautiously said, “Hello, Grandma?”

The poor things were apprehensive. A handset that rests in a base alongside a keypad is foreign to them. You might as well have given the kids a box of cassette tapes and said, “Listen to these, we think you’ll like them.”

Each time they called, and I identified myself as Grandma, they responded with silence followed by breathing. Little did they know that is how people used to prank one another on landlines.

They’re too young to have their own cell phones, but their mom and dad wanted a way for them to dial out if needed, or for others to call in to make sure the house was still standing.

The three were “home alone” for the first time, as much as kids are ever “home alone” when Dad works from home in an office with glass-paned doors next to the family room.

Mom was out for part of the day, the kids had no school and we agreed to call and check on them.

One ring, two rings, “Hello?” a quivering voice answered.

“Hello, it’s Grandma,” I said. “Who’s this?”

“It’s me,” the soft voice whispered. It was the youngest of the three.

“Great,” I said. “Is everyone getting along?”

“No. I was elbowed.” She then launched into a long story about how an older sister elbowed her earlier.

This is incredible because, though the child has never used a landline before, she instinctively, intrinsically, automatically knows its primary function is for tattling on a sibling.

Slam dunk for the 6-year-old.

There are other landline skills the girls are coming by naturally as well. The landline has a cord that they can stretch, twist and wind around their arms and legs and then spend half an hour untangling the cord.

The downside of their landline is that they only have one. The kids will never know the joy of an extension phone. They will never hear someone yell, “Get off the extension! Now!”

And because not many other families have landlines, they will never know the nerve-wracking intimidation of talking to a friend’s mother or father before being able to talk to the friend.

Here’s a question for all the philosophers reading: If you slam a landline down on a cell phone call, does it make a slamming sound or just a click on the cell phone?

The girls are growing at ease with the landline. The novelty is slowly wearing off. Who knows how their parents will top the landline.

They could always switch out the large flat-screen television for a small portable job, with rabbit ears, that you have to stand up and walk over to in order to change the channel. Just a thought.

 

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Count your blessings, not your calories

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‘Tis the season to be thankful, which is why I am hanging tight to the fourth Thursday in November. I may be hanging on by the greasy tip of a wishbone swinging dangerously low over scalding hot gravy, but I refuse to let go of Thanksgiving, the only holiday that has not been grossly commercialized.

For starters, I am thankful there is no giant turkey at the mall. If you know about a mall charging outrageous prices for pictures of kids with a giant turkey, don’t tell me. Spare me.

There is a horn full of plenty of other things to be thankful for as well.

I am thankful that not one of our neighbors has an entire cast of First Thanksgiving giant inflatable figures towering in their yards.


I am thankful that there is no tradition of stuffing turkey cavities with a glut of candy, cheap trinkets and presents soon forgotten. I am thankful that the primary thing we stuff at Thanksgiving is ourselves. Can I have an amen?

I am thankful for Thanksgivings past on my grandparents’ farm with a slew of aunts and uncles and more than two dozen cousins. I am thankful that when the adults had enough, they had the wisdom to shout—loudly and in unison—“All you kids, get outside and stay outside!”

Oh, that children today should enjoy such harsh edicts.

We were forbidden to go near the pigs or the milk cows, but we could peek in on the horses, climb into the hayloft, befriend a cat, discover kittens, play with the dogs, or wander aimlessly through the woods.

Go ahead, punish me like that again.

I am thankful for all the Thanksgiving meals my mother made, for steam rolling down the kitchen window as that doohickey on top of the pressure cooker rocked wildly, for pumpkin pies made from the recipe on the Libby’s label, warm dinner rolls, sage stuffing and a pretty table set with the good dishes and candles. The woman worked culinary wonders in a very small kitchen with, at most, 3-square-feet of counter space.

I am thankful for every year Dad paused between bites and said, “Not another house on the entire street is eating a meal as fine as this one.” I didn’t know how he knew that, but I knew he was right.

Although many of those people are gone now, I am thankful for the memories etched deep into my heart.

This year, I am thankful that I am the one hosting Thanksgiving. Between all of us, we have three 6-foot folding tables and benches. Weather providing, I am confident I can sell the group on eating outdoors as a tribute to the First Thanksgiving.

I am thankful that sometime after the meal, a son-in-law will start the crossword and not bristle when a gaggle of kids breathe down the back of his neck and clamor to help.

I am thankful that the grandkids will go outside without even being told to go outside. There will be football, kickball, basketball and steal-the-flag as daylight wanes and another Thanksgiving fades into the twilight.

I am grateful they will all take home leftovers so we will not gain five pounds each, consuming hundreds of thousands of calories all by ourselves.

As they all load into cars, Grandpa will assume sprinter position on the sidewalk and race each vehicle to the corner. I will stand in the driveway, waving goodbye and praying for each one of them until the last car is out of sight.

It is good to give thanks.

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Cooking up a surprise dish

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Years ago, a bona fide gourmet cook showed me how she passed off store-bought bread as homemade by sprinkling a little sifted flour on top.

From that day forward, I was always suspicious of her offerings at large gatherings, although I greatly admired her ability to economize time and energy.

Not long after, my mother tried to pull a fast one on us as well. She was a wonderful baker known for her Christmas cookies. But one year they looked just a little too perfect, a little too uniform and a little too thick.

She said it was a new recipe from a friend. It was. The cookies were from her new best friend, Mrs. Fields, who lived at the mall.

I told her the next time she needed to smear the frosting on a couple of them to make it believable—and not to leave the box in the kitchen trash, but to take it to the garage.

For me, the biggest time and labor expenditure before a big family gathering is making mashed potatoes. So, from time to time, I have engaged the assistance of my good friend Bob. Bob’s last name is Evans. He lives in the refrigerated case by the meat section at the grocery. I know Bob likes helping me, because the word “Family” is stamped in big, bold letters on his containers.


Because we have some purists in the family, I let Bob rest in a slow cooker set to low before people arrive. I then garnish the Bob potatoes with a pat of butter and sprinkle of fresh parsley before ferrying them to the table.

The finer palettes in the family are all on to me—but that doesn’t mean Bob and I are dissolving the partnership.

The second most time-consuming dish before a family gathering is potato salad. The potato salad of a nearby deli is highly regarded by many in the family. So, I did a taste test not long ago.

The oohing and ahhing over the potato salad and “best ever” comments went on and on until a son-in-law put his fork down and named the deli.

Busted.

One of the grands looked at me with big eyes and asked if it was really homemade.

“Well,” I said, “I went to the deli, brought it home and made it sit on the table. Homemade.”

I rest my case. And my kitchen.

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Constant requests for reviews rate one star

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Does anyone remember when you made a purchase, went to a doctor or took your car in for a repair and weren’t asked for a review? We are in the throes of review mania.

I recently visited a new dentist. Two hours after I left his office a text arrived asking for a review. I hesitated. What if I inadvertently posted something he took the wrong way? I could be looking at a root canal.

Plus, how do you review a dentist you’ve been to one time? The best I could think of was: “Nice guy and the waiting room didn’t smell like fluoride.” I didn’t leave a review.


A month later the dentist sent me a birthday card. I felt so terrible for not leaving a review that I began grinding my teeth at night. It could have been a plot.

Every time I get the oil changed in the car, I’m asked for a review.

How can I review an oil change? I can’t see the fellow working. He’s down in a

pit and I’m in a waiting area. I usually hear some rattling, but for all I know he is just banging tools against the underbody. I’ll leave a review after another 5,000 miles.

After a medical procedure that required sedation, I was asked to review my experience. How could I review the experience when I was unconscious?

Every bank, credit company, home and auto insurance rep we talk to on the phone wants us to hang on for a brief survey.

So many review opportunities, so little time.

Every time I check out at Walmart, a screen asks me to rate my visit. Since I always use self-checkout, I always leave five stars. It is basically a self-review. Glad to see I am doing well.

When my old Fitbit died and I was too cheap to buy another, I bought an off brand. I walked three miles and it registered as two. Then it began reporting my heart rate was 254 bpm. I reset the watch and my heart rate read 357 bpm. I should have been flat on the ground, but there I was briskly walking my “two miles.”

I returned the watch and received an email asking me to post a review.

Check and done.

Leaving a restaurant with a friend recently, the waitress gave us each an oversized bookmark asking for a review. We both thought that was daring considering the food arrived cold and she never returned with any water.

What percentage of customers write reviews? Depends on who you ask. Some sources claim as many as 74 percent of Boomers, 70 percent of Gen Xers and 60 percent of Millennials leave reviews. Other sources say only 5 to 10 percent of customers write reviews.

What we really need is someone willing to review the reviews.

 

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Of mice and men and women and grandmas

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When I was a little girl taking piano lessons, we lived in an old house with a dark, scary basement where mice frequently gathered and hosted parties.

Sometimes, mice ventured upstairs and hid behind the piano. When I began practicing, they would shoot out due to the horrible off-key sounds piercing their teeny, tiny, perfect-pitch sensitive ears.

I would jump up on the piano bench and scream and cry. Forte. Super forte. With the biggest crescendos you ever heard in your life.

I blame mice for the fact that I failed to become a concert pianist. It has nothing at all to do with the fact I had no talent.

My in-laws lived in a farmhouse that was a hundred years old and had mice. My husband assured me the mice had been trained by a mouse-whisperer named D. Con to stay in the cellar and on the ground floor and never, ever went upstairs.

One evening, we went upstairs, turned back the bedding and discovered mice had already booked the room. The mice were gone but had left numerous calling cards and tons of teeny tiny red Solo cups in the bed. Clearly, it had been some party.

I did not respond well.

Where is the piano bench when you need it?

Every fall, our clan of 19 gets together for a weekend. This year, I reserved three rooms in an inn at a state park, as well as a cabin we can squeeze into for meals.

The cabin has two beds and a pull-out sofa, which can take overflow kids from the inn. I was on the park website double-checking numbers and beds, figuring out sleeping arrangements, when I noticed recent reviews mentioning mice.

One reviewer said two mice darted across the room while they were having dinner. Another reviewer said a mouse greeted them when they entered the cabin.

Sure. It’s in the woods and the mice were there first. I understand.

But the mice aren’t paying—we are.

The real worry is this: should any mice appear, our group is incapable of a united front. We are a family divided.

We have the Get Them Before They Get You wing, which I am hoping is a clear majority.

We also have the Preservationist wing. They will agree that any mice need to go, but will insist on dispersing them in a peaceful manner consisting of coaxing, cajoling and luring them with small treats consisting of our meals.

The group that has me awake at 3 a.m. is the Catch and Keep wing. There are at least three, possibly four or five, that will want to catch them, name them, feed them, build them little houses out of toilet tissue in a dresser drawer and carry them in their pockets when we go hiking.

Fingers crossed we get a cabin that is mouse-free.

I’m taking a piano bench just in case.

___________________________________________________

 

 

 

 

 

*The answer to last week’s Jumble was “WRITE ON”

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Brain functions well in a jumble

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I’ve read that doing puzzles helps keep your brain sharp as you age.

I don’t like to brag, but I can often solve the Jumble puzzle at a glance. After years of making millions of typos at the keyboard, I’m accustomed to seeing words with letters in the worng odrer.

A granddaughter brought over a new game called “Mobi.” It’s like Scrabble but all the little tiles have numbers, plus, minus, multiply, divide and equal signs on them. The goal is to see how fast you can use all your tiles making math equations in a Scrabble-like configuration.

I’ve played it with her five times now and she’s won every game. I told her she doesn’t need to bring it over anymore.

The critical issue with my brain is storage. Most of my brain is taken up with random miscellany. I fear my brain is basically a large kitchen junk drawer—a few essential facts and figures nestled amid a whole lot of dead AA batteries, old keys and dried up ink pens.

Why is it that I can remember my phone number from when I was in kindergarten? It’s not like someday I will try to call my younger self. Our phone number started with Ingersoll 6. That tells you how long ago my childhood was.

I can’t always remember all the words to hymns we sing at church, but I can remember my high school fight song — and the motions with pom-poms that went with it. (Bonus points!) “Y-E-L-L-O-W  J-A-C-K-E-T-S! We yell it! We spell it! All through the game!”

To my credit, I’ve never broken out with the Yellow Jacket fight song midway through a hymn.

I sometimes can’t remember where I left my reading glasses, but I clearly remember the look on the face of my fourth-grade teacher Mrs. Grimsley, tears pooling in her eyes, when she told us President Kennedy had been shot.

I remember 90 percent of everything I learned in high school shorthand class. I was good— not as good as my friend Jo Ann, who entered shorthand contests and won awards, but I was going places with my shorthand skills. I went to a computer keyboard.

I’m not sure how Jo Ann fared. Last I heard she was teaching at Cornell, so I guess shorthand worked out well for her, too.

I can remember how long I was in labor with each of our three children. You don’t forget that. You can’t afford to forget that. It comes in handy even now.

I have three-ring notebooks filled with recipes, but I don’t have many of my mom’s recipes in writing. They’re in my brain, floating amid random paper clips, old ChapSticks and dried up tubes of Gorilla Glue. A dash of this, a dash of that, potato salad, baked beans and brisket. Everything a good cook needs to know.

It’s fun to rummage through the catchall drawer now and then. You often find forgotten treasures tucked in the corners.

 

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