The ebb and flow of life has carried me to a variety of countries. As some of you know we live in Asia. 2007 has been difficult in many ways. My wife's mother was forced to move in with us this spring. My wife's father, hospitalized a year ago this time, passed away several weeks ago.
That said, Christmas is my favorite holiday. The myth and the commercial mumbo-jumbo don't bother me much. Christmas is, for me, a time of rebirth, intense optimism and unconditional love. It's a time for giving. It's the (rare) time I make an extra effort to find the good in folks I normally think very little of. But that's not the point.
The point is that this year in 2008 millions of people in North America will spend Christmas in shelters, on welfare, or on the street.
I know. I've done all three.
When I travel today I'm free to choose business class. I rarely do, but it's nice to have that choice. My wife and I decided to marry on a Christmas trip to Thailand about a dozen years ago. We have a good life, for which we're both grateful.
In 1987, however, I spent Christmas in different company in a Salvation Army Mission in Toronto. I don't know how many folks will read this, but I'd like to tell you about one of the folks I met there.
I won't bore you with how I got there. Things were bad. I was in danger of losing my highly prestigious job placing handbills in mail boxes in the sort of neighborhoods I'd left behind years before. A van would pick us off the street outside the Mission at 3 am, take us to an all-night restaurant. We'd be 'fronted' breakfast and smokes. The day would end around two. I'd drink until the day's pay, about forty bucks, was gone. Then I'd stumble into one of the local Missions. Often this would be the "Sally Ann".
Those who've been on the street; or institutions know the drill. Stand in line to get in, stand in line for a bed, stand in line for dinner and go to bed. Corner top bunks easily visible are safest. Tie your boots on the pipes running along the high ceiling. Cleanliness is rarely a priority for residents.
Lights out at ten. Then rhythmic squeaking from beds in the darkness. I thought my fellow residents were jerking off. Uh-uh. Enamel grinding against enamel carries a long way. The moans are different, too. We can run during daylight, but there's no escape in dreams.
Line up for breakfast at 6:00 am. One morning I was waiting for sandwiches , which would be passed through window to the kitchen. I recognized the face on the other side, a face from the past, the days of wine and roses.
This guy had been an artist. We'd worked together in one of the city's tonier restaurants. Now he was handing out sandwiches in the Salvation Army. Our eyes met. I looked away first. Several years later, I was sober.
Life changed on the outside and the inside, too.
Why am I telling you about this guy? Because he was in the Sally Ann working off his demons. I've met lots of good people and lots of crazy ones, too.
In the ebb and flow of my time here I've been called a 'troll', accused of excusing genocide, and sundry other insults. They don't matter much. I once again saw the second button appear below my tag-line recently and decided to peek behind the curtain. I saw two folks I respect hammering away at one another.
wiscmass is one of the real heroes on this site. He stands up against anti-Semites in meat world. I read the diary in question. He stated clearly his unambiguous respect for the Salvation Army and the good work they do. Folks claiming disbelief simply don't know how nutty folks working for charities can be.
The tambourine bangers at the Salvation Army are as mixed-up as anyone I've ever met. And I know some real crazies. I get to look in the mirror at one everyday.
The man outside the store where the nice people shop in the Santa Suit dishing out abuse isn't there because his life is working out the way he planned.
Guaranteed.
The man in the Santa Suit sounds exactly like a lot of people I know trying to keep the demons at bay. Clearly, in his case, it's not working.
Does that excuse his behavior? No.
This year we'll be giving money to a corrupt international organization that will most likely lose or steal a substantial portion. But some will get through.
We give every year to deeply-flawed organizations and individuals simply for the good they do.
This afternoon when I finish work, I'll go buy the present my wife told me not get. We'll all bundle up to see Christmas illuminations in Tokyo, always a strange experience. This year may a little less Christmas like in the unseasonably warm weather brought about by our failure to reign in the real madmen.
Electing Dems really is the best way I know to make the world a better place. And in doing so, I'm keeping some of the demons from my own door.
Give to those you like, but please recall that within all the religion and the craziness, the Salvation Army and other religious charities are taking care of those that government has failed. The imperfect, sometimes twisted souls, are doing their best. I'm grateful to them all and to folks here.
Merry Christmas.