The Spirit of Giving: and what that looks like at the US Post Office

Never go to the Post Office a week before Christmas. The lines look like this:

I had one of the more annoying postal experiences I've ever had the other day when I ended up standing in front of two women mailing packages in a long line of people who made it in half an hour before the post office closed at 5pm. 

The women commented constantly about the gluttony and selfishness of Christmas and how they could not understand why anyone needed any of the stuff in there. They talked about how they were better people than anyone because they choose to be kind and give things to the poor or homeless people (like poems they wrote). They criticized a teenage girl with a "My Heart Belongs to Him" shirt asking whether she meant the pope. When she responded that she just got it with her boyfriend they reminded her that "him's come and go but there's one Him that will always stick around". 

Yuck. I think part of being kind and courteous to other people is not bombarding them with your views. I think that the nicest thing that you could do in a post office is assume that about everyone there has good intentions. I was feeling quite a bit of Christmas spirit until I spent 45 uncomfortable minutes at the Vancouver Post Office. I decided that if I need to send any more packages that they can certainly wait until after Christmas. 

Christmas Time and Travel

Christmas time is largely about relaxing and enjoying loved family and friends. Seems every year there is a bit of a mad dash to purchase presents for everybody and get them wrapped, try to please everybody's wishes for what the holiday should look like, and get things done but overall the spirit of it all is that we get to spend quality time together. It's often that I get sick over the Christmas break. I think my body is finally able to take a break so it crashes a bit.

This year I get to relax quite a bit and will spend most of my holiday break in Spokane with my parents. What I wish, is that I could afford the time and money to take my own little trip wherever I want sometime. Lately, all of my travelling is usually to satisfy someone else's wishes about where they want to go, who is getting married, etc.

Maybe my Christmas wish this year is that in the coming year, I will get the opportunity again to travel somewhere I really want to go and enjoy a relaxing vacation and interesting experience outside of America. Maybe that ought to be my New Year's resolution. To go somewhere new and exciting to take a real vacation.