The Funny Thing Is... (4 page)

“Nobody cares about the miracles anymore,” she continued. “The miracles just go by unnoticed.”

“What was the last miracle?” She started to cry, upset that I had to ask.

“It was the toilet that flushes automatically,” she said, her eyes welling up with tears. “Before that it was the George Foreman grill… the fat just drips right off.”

Well, I guess it was the Chablis making me feel more relaxed or something, but I was loosened up enough to say, “God, I have to admit, I’ve really felt alone a lot. I’ve felt like you didn’t exist. I just didn’t believe in you for a while.”

She said, “Do you remember that day you were walking on the beach?”

I said, “Yeah.”

“Well, I was there.”

“But there was just one set of footprints.”

She said, “I was on your back.”

“I
thought
I felt heavy that day. I thought it was water retention.”

“No,” she said. “Know when you are bloated, I am there.”

That comforts me.

I’m not going to bore you with everything. We talked about so many things. She told me the meaning of life … stuff like that. Suddenly, in the middle of our conversation, she got up and gently put her arms around me and said it was time for me to go. She had another visitor arriving at 3:30, God explained, and had to wash out the wineglasses and prepare more fondue. As I waved good-bye to her I had such a feeling of inner peace and tranquility. I got into my car and noticed that Henry Winkler was walking up to God’s door. He gave me a funny look, but it might’ve been because I was still stark naked.

But who cares? I felt free, finally having a clear picture of just how precious life is, and why we shouldn’t let ourselves be strangled by doubt and fear. I also learned something just as valuable. If I could meet God, I thought, I could meet just about anyone or do just about anything. There’s no reason to live a life of regret. If I really put my mind to it, if I truly believe, one day I could learn how to macrame.

I can only pray.

AUTHOR’S
NOTE:

Although I’ve specified the holidays in this chapter, you can apply this advice to all gift-giving and getting situations
—
except Arbor Day! When it comes to Arbor Day, the only rules are
There Are No Rules!
Wait, that might be the rules for spring break. I’ll have to check my files
.

Sure, when you first read the title of this chapter you thought, “Come on, Ellen, this is one area of my life where your infinite wisdom and eerie insight are not necessary.” But think about it: What time of year is the most stressful, painful, and all-around disappointing? Yes, New Year’s Eve! And that’s because you’re finally releasing all the stress and resentment that the holiday gift-giving season has heaped upon your weary shoulders.

The whole idea of exchanging gifts is much more complicated than most people realize, so stop denying that you need help, unclench your jaw (see, I know what it feels like), and finish this chapter. You’ll never waste another fifty dollars on a last-minute wine and cheese basket again.

Now, you may be thinking,
Hey, Ellen, even though you’re being very funny and I enjoy your witty insights and lighthearted ribbing, it really is the thought that counts
. If you are thinking that, then I thank you for the compliment, but quit your infernal thinking and listen to me for a second.

The saying “It’s the thought that counts” was coined as an emotional Band-Aid by someone who left all of her shopping until nine o’clock Christmas Eve… or the night before the first day of Hanukah or until right before Kwanzaa or until the twilight of the day of winter solstice.
[Please write to my publisher if I forgot to include your chosen cultural gift-giving holiday]
If it’s really the thought that counts, then why don’t we ever tell people what we were thinking when we were scrambling to buy them their last-minute panic gift? “It was less than twenty dollars and I hardly ever see him that much anyway.” We don’t say these things because it’s not the thought of the giver that counts. The “thought that counts” is the thought the getter is thinking after the wrapping paper has been torn away.

If we were really thoughtful, we would buy presents for people that they could, in turn, give away to the people still left on
their
shopping lists. Your friend could unwrap your gift to find a wrapped gift with his niece’s name right on the tag, ready to go. You just bought him three hours
not
spent in a mall. Now that’s thoughtful!

It takes this kind of effort and creativity to figure out what would make a good gift for someone. You have to consider what the person likes, what they already have, what they care about, what they need; basically you have to invest a lot of your time. And since time is the one thing none of us has anymore, we end up giving a box-set of Bailey’s Irish Cream liqueur with shot glasses with “Luck o’ the Irish” stamped on the front of them. It looks like a gift, it seems like a gift, but no one ever uses, drinks, or looks at it after December 26 … or December 8 or the week of the 12th.
[Please write to my publisher if the date you throw away useless gifts was not mentioned above.]

It wasn’t like that back in the good old days, when dear old dad would spend all summer and most of the fall whittling you your own train set out of freshly cut pine. That’s back when thoughts really did count and you could go to the movies all day for a nickel and not get kidnapped. But as times will do, times have changed. If you gave a kid a homemade pine train set today, he would sue you for breach of contract. (Why people sign Christmas contracts with their children these days, I will never know.)

Since we can’t, as adults, get away with throwing bad presents against a wall and bursting into tears, Christmas is the time of year when we all become really good at lying. Lying is just another form of acting, so in a way, we are all actors in a forty-eight-hour play that runs from the 24th through the 25th of December. Again, unless you’re Jewish, in which case you have to fake it for eight days straight. There are people in Los Angeles who pay thousands of dollars for that kind of rigorous training. Last year, my mother should have at least received a Best Actress nomination for her performance after opening the shoe tree my aunt gave her. It was gritty, real, and heart-wrenching; in short, a tour de force.

Because of this widely accepted deceit, it’s very hard to tell if someone really likes the gift you got for them (the eggnog doesn’t help either), so here’s a quick checklist that you can use. You know, for checking.

How to tell if someone doesn’t like the gift you have given them

1. They say, “I love it.”

If they say they love it, you can be sure they hate it. Loving a towel rack makes no sense, so clearly they’re overcompensating for the feelings of guilt and shame about the deeper feelings of anger and resentment they have about being given a towel rack for Christmas. Or maybe they’ve gone insane with rage over getting such an impersonal, utilitarian gift after thirty-five years of marriage. (Just a tip: Never give any kind of rack as a gift. I don’t care how nice the rack is. Yes, even rack of lamb.)

2. They say, “Thank you.”

“Thank you” is such a loaded statement. The nuances are imperceptible, woven with sarcasm, irony, and plain old sass. The person might as well just spit on your shoe. Special circumstance: If they sigh, shake their head, and stare deeply into your eyes right before they say it, they are an impostor and you should call the police.

3. They say, “Where did you get it?”

The nerve! Why don’t they just say, “Does the store give cash refunds so that I can return this and finally get something I actually want?” Quick fix: Buy all your gifts in Japan. That way, nobody wins.

Epilogue: The Myth of Handmade Gifts

Unreturnable, unusable, unsightly, unfun. These are just some of the words you can use to describe handmade gifts. Unless you’re related to a talented furniture maker, a clothing designer, or you are someone’s grandma, getting a handmade gift for Christmas is
never
not disappointing. Even grandmas secretly hate them, but society forces them to repress their real feelings about being gypped. Instead, they have to pretend they love multicolored, glitter-covered macaroni sculptures. Why do we put the aged through this kind of strain? They just want a
DVD
player like everyone else.

When considering giving a homemade gift, just think to yourself,
Is this a gift I would like to get
? And then think to yourself,
Why do I still have this leather-burning tool when putting your name on the back of your belt went out of style in 1976?
And then think,
Is it right for me to heap the by-products of my knitting hobby onto my friends and family in lieu of buying them actual gifts that cost actual money?
And then think,
Why am I so selfish? Not just about the crafts, but about everything I do and say. It’s always “Me, me, me”
and
“Look what I can make and look how fast I can knit
.”

I
never think about what it would be like to receive a scarf with leather piping that has my name burnt into it. It would be creepy and irritating. Especially because when it’s wrapped, it’s exactly the shape as two bars of gold. There. I think I’ve said my piece.

With all this in mind, get out there and let the people you care about most (or whose names you drew in the Secret Santa gift exchange at work) know exactly how much you’re thinking of them this holiday season by picking out fun, useful, and exciting gifts.

Then, after you’ve been shopping for two hours and you realize you don’t know what your father’s interests are, give up and go to the bulletproof option: the gift certificate.

I think people talk too much.

Talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. Sometimes, when people are talking, in my mind all I’m saying is
shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah
…

People are scared of silence. If you find silence, people always have to fill it with something. The world is so full of noise, it’s nearly impossible to find silence. I happen to believe that silence is golden. In life, it’s one small thing I can hold onto. Silence is where all of our answers are. It’s where our truth is. Our passion, our path, our everything… All the answers are in silence, if you can find it.

I was outside not too long ago and I tried to meditate. I closed my eyes and I got to that still place that everybody talks about—just for a moment, but I was there. And the first message that I got, so strongly and so clearly, was that we are all one. Every living thing, we are all connected. And the next thing I felt was this little tiny thing in the palm of my hand, and I opened one eye. I saw this little mosquito sitting there, this little prehistoric-looking creature—this strange bug. And I was thinking about how we are all connected and I looked at this thing and then I just … killed it. Then I went back to my loving state of being.

And the next thing I heard was, “Would you like anything else or will that be all?” I told the waiter, “I was meditating, idiot. Thanks a lot for interrupting!” He wasn’t getting a tip anyway. It had taken forever to get the veal. So I decided an outdoor cafe was not the best place to be spiritual. People are too rude and stupid. So I left and started walking to my car, which was about three blocks away. The parking situation is crazy because the world is overpopulated with the wrong kinds of people.

So, back to the loving place. I was walking and I saw my car and I saw a meter maid standing at my car writing a ticket. “Oh please, wait… stop. Please don’t write the ticket, I’m here,” I said.

And she said, “Oh, I’m sorry, but you’re parked illegally in front of a fire hydrant.”

“Oh!
Illegally in front of afire hydrant
,” I said, mocking her.

“Please stop talking to me that way,” she said.

So I took a different approach. “Please be compassionate, don’t give me the ticket, I’m here.”

And she said, “Oh, I’m sorry, I’ve already started writing, I can’t stop.”

“Oh, that’s how it works? You’ve already started writing, so you can’t stop? Okay, well I would like to not hit you but my fist is already in the air, okay?”

And … back to the loving place.

I got into my car and lit a cigarette and prayed to be led where I should be, and I heard, “Drive!” (It was the meter maid.)

So I started driving and it’s so hard to drive and be compassionate and loving because of the way people drive. I was behind someone and they were going so slow I could have gotten out of my car and walked around and said, “Sorry I have to pass you but you’re going a little too slow.” Anyway, so I pulled around to give them that “I hate you” look. (How else are they going to learn, right? It’s up to us.) And it turns out it was a nun. Can you believe that? I said, “Why don’t you take a vow not to drive! Drop it like a bad habit!”

And … back to the loving place.

Again I found myself praying to be led where I should be. And then I saw a health food store, just right there. It appeared right before my eyes, and I thought,
Well, that seems spiritual. I’ve never been in a health food store before
. I don’t know if you’ve ever been in a health food store but if that’s healthy, sorry—don’t want to be it.

The people who work at these places are so proud of themselves. “Guess how old I am?” they say.

“I don’t know.”

“Guess, guess.”

“Thirty?”

“I’m sixteen, but the point is, I’ve never had dairy!” So I go into this health food store and the person at the counter says, “Let me see your tongue.”

“What?”

“Let me see your tongue… Oh, you’re full of toxins!”

“
You’re
full of toxins. What a stupid thing to say to me.” It turns out I needed an herb for something inside me— like the spleen or something else that’s inside—because something needed something because of something that happened. I learned this because the health food person practices this thing called kinesiology. They put herbs in your hand and if your arm goes down you need those herbs. This sounds stupid, but actually it’s not—it works. I’ll tell you, last week I was at Gucci and I had a sweater in my hand and it went right down. A couple of minutes earlier I had a dress in my hand and it didn’t go down at all! See? It works.