Car­o­line C Rav­el­lo

We're just at the point where the gates are go­ing to open and the eu­pho­ria will be el­e­vat­ed to fren­zy. I know that place. It's the one where the Christ­mas bonus meets the residue of No­vem­ber's salary and col­lides with the ap­par­ent wind­fall of an ear­ly De­cem­ber pay.

This is when the dol­lar, or­di­nar­i­ly a hap­less red or blue piece of pa­per, out­smarts you. I can see you now, smil­ing like the man on the Quak­er Oats box, mak­ing a list and to­tal­ly ig­nor­ing it as you walk in­to the sight, sounds, and smell of the city bustling with bar­gains.

The rich­ness of Christ­mas over­whelms you and in­fus­es you with an at­ti­tude of wealth and pros­per­i­ty. You can have the world-no, you can buy the world.

The lights of Christ­mas have al­ready been switched on in pub­lic squares, on city streets and in homes. The parang, so­ca-parang and Nat King Cole's O Holy Night il­lu­mi­nate the heart light and your chest brims with joy. This is so beau­ti­ful.

Last year, I heard a woman say, "I love Christ­mas"-but that was to clar­i­fy her non-stop clean­ing, scrub­bing, and gen­er­al ex­as­per­a­tion at her house­hold. She was tired, cranky, and said the most abu­sive things to them. I had to tell her that if her love for Christ­mas made her this wretched she should learn to dis­like it.

This year, with changed cir­cum­stances, she pro­fess­es that the calm in her de­meanour is be­cause she be­lieves "has­sling one­self for Christ­mas is not worth it." (There is hope.) She now stands apart from those who are so ad­dict­ed to the hub­bub they're deign to re­peat the fol­ly-those who mis­take the mon­ey in hand for dis­pos­able in­come and flut­ter like fren­zied flies.

The hol­i­days could re­al­ly give mon­ey a bad name. Life­less as it is, mon­ey has been mis­named the root of all evil-the Bible ac­tu­al­ly says, "the love of mon­ey is the root of all evil," the bene­fac­tor of hap­pi­ness, and a whole lot of things that it could nev­er do with­out hu­man ac­tion.

We say, "Mon­ey talks and bull---t walks", but I keep look­ing in my purse and there has not been an io­ta of con­ver­sa­tion be­tween us or among them-the notes and coins, I mean. In­stead, I've used my mind to di­rect the mon­ey where it needs to go and though it "speaks," it's nev­er ob­ject­ed to my ex­ec­u­tive de­ci­sions.

I tried to steer my son Jo­van clear of these ex­cess­es be­cause a long time ago I saw what it did to peo­ple's dis­po­si­tion dur­ing and af­ter the hol­i­days. We seemed to have done well, re­sist­ing the temp­ta­tion to overeat, over drink, over­work, and over-ex­tend. But that wis­dom came from ex­pe­ri­ence.

I re­mem­ber once set­ting aside my med­ica­tion for the sea­son. There was a con­tra-in­dica­tive re­ac­tion with the al­co­hol I so want­ed to have, so it had to go.

But I soon learned that that's an ab­solute no-no for de­pres­sives on meds. I love the hol­i­days but I care for be­ing and feel­ing well more than any­thing else and if there is a pre­scrip­tion drug in that equa­tion, then I am tak­ing it!

I'll get my best friends and clos­est rel­a­tives to ask me each ec­sta­t­ic day if I've tak­en them. And, in any case, at the first sight of crank­i­ness, Jo­van will chirp in with, "Yuh take yuh hap­py pills?"

I love the tra­di­tions too, but cog­nisant of my cir­cum­stances, and armed with the knowl­edge that the po­ten­tial for a psy­chot­ic break is in­creased at this time, I pre­fer the ones I have cre­at­ed, which al­low me to stay on track emo­tion­al­ly, fi­nan­cial­ly, and so­cial­ly.

Mak­ing your tra­di­tions is a way to con­quer the lu­na­cy of Christ­mas­time and have an en­joy­able hol­i­day.

For most of his years, Jo­van has bare­ly held on to my Christ­mas-birth­day gifts past mid­night on Christ­mas Eve. I love that at a nano-sec­ond past mid­night he ap­pears bear­ing gifts-even when I say I have every­thing I need-and I must en­ter­tain him by open­ing them all.

Re­cent­ly, I've had my ma­ter­nal aunt Agatha Joseph, the ma­tri­arch of the fam­i­ly now in her 85th year, with me for the hol­i­days and you can­not know the de­light she brings. A more down-to-earth, af­fa­ble hu­man be­ing you could not find, so my day is filled with rau­cous laugh­ter or, what­ev­er. She is al­so a gospel min­is­ter, and al­ways brings a bal­anced sense of ap­pre­ci­a­tion for the rea­son we cel­e­brate Christ­mas.

If I have my bud­dies Pa­tri­cia Bethel and Deb­o­rah Mills with me it will make for a com­plete sea­son filled with the won­der­ful tra­di­tion of be­ing with the friends and fam­i­ly you love who love you the most.

And so, in my life, in­stead of a rush­ing to and fro grab­bing this and that, there is a co­gent fo­cus on love and life and a com­mit­ment to re­main­ing healthy and hap­py through­out the hol­i­days. I wish it up­on you, too!