Yesterday was new book shipment day at work, always an enjoyable occasion. However, it was also the first day for Stage 2 shoppers.
This reinforces what Gilbert said in his book, I think. We could go up to any random person who hasn’t begun holiday preparations in November (no, it would have to be a person who feels responsible for holiday preparations) and say, “On December 7th, you will begin to be so stressed that you will be telling your troubles to strangers in stores.”
They will tell us why that won’t be true because they are different and special, but I find by checking back on my xanga that Pearl Harbor Day is reliably the first day for seeing people who are stressed and miserable about their holiday preparations. I try to say something comforting, if they seem to be in the mood for that, or something to suggest that I am in the same boat, if they seem more in a “misery loves company” mood.
In one of the new books I found a soothing carol called “The Winds Through the Olive Trees.” If you click on the title you will find a page where you can, by searching around a little, find a midi of this 16th century Gascon carol played on a several different stringed instruments, with a bit of whistling thrown in for good measure. Here you can find a neon-bright page with lyrics and a midi of the melody. You can learn it really quickly. Then teach it to any children you happen to have hanging around, and you can all sing it, swaying gently, any time you feel stressed.
I may see if that helps our Stage 2 shoppers.
I am not feeling too stressed, myself, though it is clear that I will not actually be able to do everything I had planned to do. There was also this message from my Sunday School co-teacher, whose turn it is to lead this week, saying “Do you have clay you can use, or should I get you some?” To this I wanted to respond, “Huh?” This woman is gone two thirds of the time. Missions in Tanzania, I think, is her specious excuse for leaving me to do all the work. And now she wants me to do something with clay on the day she is supposed to lead?
And also my boys have eaten all the cookies from the freezer. Fortunately, The Empress has a recipe that makes a lot of cookies (mine all make about two dozen) so I can whip up that 6.5 dozen for next week’s fundraiser. Last year, I just pulled out 6.5 dozen of the ones I had made according to the HGP schedule and calmly dropped them off on the way to work.
And tomorrow I have two brunches to attend before I go to work. I will be fitting present-making in around these events. I toyed with the idea of taking my soldering iron to work with me, but have rejected it.
So I can sympathize a bit with the Stage 2 shoppers. I am reminding myself that I have done everything I absolutely have to do, and the rest of the things can be dropped if need be. It is easy to be sort of infected by the Stage 2 shoppers and the holiday magazines and stuff, so this sort of self-reminder is essential.
And I will be singing “The Winds Through the Olive Trees” and possibly waltzing about a bit as I do so.
I avoided Stage 2 by doing it all on Amazon, at night, in my jammies. I suppose my stage 2 stress is directed at the thought of making something for my husband for Christmas.
I’m not familiar with Stage 1 or Stage 2 or any stages at all. I guess if I weren’t behind in my reading of your blog that I would be in the know. I am feeling a little stressed, but like you I am willing to drop whatever needs dropped and not let it ruin my holidays. Most of my stress is revolving around making sure that I still have funding for the plans I have left, and a birthday party thrown in on the 16th for my boy turning 16 on the 19th. I am feeling quite lucky that it’s a boys’ party and not a sweet sixteen for a girl. And now that I think about it, I think most of my stress is actually work related. The title of that song sounds very familiar to me. I will check it out!
well I am a stage 2 shopper. I guess you see it as storming the normandy beaches…
You are allowed to be human, and flawed. That’s permitted. Just sway gently in the cottonpicking breeze, and let it all blow over.
I will not even try to express the way I feel about sons whose idea of helping with the holidays is to steal all the cookies in the freezer and eat them. I’m shocked. How could they do that? Is there some redeeming explanation, like “Both of them lost their minds, at the same time?” My suggestion would be that they be required to bake all the replacement cookies for you, and that you not cook anything for them until they get that done.
Actually, they explained to me that they were rescuing the cookies, because they don’t taste good when they have been in the freezer. The effect is the same. I like your idea, though.
I like Ozarque’s suggestion. Or take all their shoes hostage until they stop eating your cookies.
I like the idea of you singing and swaying to de-stress. If you do it at work it might even de-stress your customers as well. They will look at you and think ‘Poor woman! I think I have problems – nothing like hers. She’s just a little bit crazy’ – and that would count as a Christmas good deed on your part.
RYC: The type of research that Gilbert is probably basing his book upon is attribution research. If ever you get the chance find some old psych textbooks and read through the summaries of research on social attribution – as an undergraduate it was my favourite area of psych. I still love teaching it because it gets the students thinking and if they are aware of the attributions and assumptions they are making there is a greater chance that they can alter their thinking into more constructive lines. Read in particular about the fundamental attribution error. (If someone other than ourself does something bad or stupid we usually assume that that someone has some sort of moral character flaw. If we do something bad or stupid however, we usually blame external circumstances – notice the paragraph above contains the fundamental attribution error. You are not singing and swaying in order to combat external stress, you are singing and swaying because you are crazy :-))
ps: I have ordered the NYC Ballet workout DVDs. Now we just need to find a teleporter. Do you think I can find one of those on Amazon.com as well?