A Tale of Two Christmases

Two years ago, I was buried in gourmet gift baskets from clients, vendors and the like. We gorged ourselves on Mrs. Fields cookies, smoked salmon, artisan cheeses, pate, crackers, Godiva chocolates and the 50 other lesser items sent in the name of corporate holiday popularity contests.

We celebrated the holiday by cramming hundreds of employees - and their spouses or dates that you met once a year - into an anonymous hotel ballroom with anonymous hotel food, wilting under heat lamps well into the night. The significant others were bored by the end of the first drink. The departments stuck together - trading work stories and past holiday stories (remember the one when...?) and trying to feel festive.

My department got half our annual bonus at Christmastime - calculated based on a portion of our salary. Expected, as long as the company did well and I did my job. It was a nice chunk of money during the holidays. Two years ago, Himself and I used a portion of it to buy Christmas for each other for the first married Christmas we'd spent together sans family. Both of us went a little overboard - hard not to, when the festivities included just the two of us.

Fast forward two years.
This year, we're dining on snippets of goodies employees are making for their neighbors or friends - rather like the taste test panel major food manufacturers use (minus the scientific background). A small, but steady, stream of festive goodies - just enough to satisfy, but hardly enough to qualify for gluttony.

Last night, The Office took everyone (and their spouses) - a total of 8 people - to one of the nicest restaurants downtown for our Christmas celebration. We dined on lovely food, prepared fresh and served in a private room. Himself was the only spouse no one else had met - as The Office frequently has events or opportunities for our small "work family" to gather together. Talk was not of work, but of sports (particularly the upcoming Sugar Bowl), politics, business, economics and topics in which everyone could participate.

We left the dinner, each of us with a slim, beautifully wrapped package. Never one for patience, I opened mine as I waited for the left-turn arrow to get on the interstate. I pulled out a gift card. I opened the envelope in which it was enclosed and gasped.

On my way home, I couldn't stop comparing the two Christmases. One was at tail end of several years of lavish spending, corporate growth and a season of "keeping up with the Jonses." One came at the beginning of what appears to be one of the worst economic seasons in decades - a time of cutting back, appreciating what one has and daily bouts of bad news. Yet, last night - this whole season - has been far more enjoyable. Everything tastes better, feels better, seems more peaceful. Appreciation over expectation.

Two years ago, the bonus check I received was just that - a bonus. Yet, it was one I expected, planned for, mentally spent before it was even in my hand. It was a solid 4-figure check. Last night's gift card was nowhere near 4 figures. In fact, it was less than 10% of my bonus check 2 years ago. Yet it was staggering in its sum - because it was a gift. Unexpected. Certainly generous and deeply appreciated.

This year, corporate carousing and novel-length gift lists may be a thing of the past (if only temporarily), and I can't help but think it's a good thing. How much better it feels to savor life one unexpected bit at a time. How much sweeter the smaller amount when it is given with appreciation rather than expectation.

Sometimes, reminders come in the strangest ways.