Hanukkah Shopping

One more gift to wrap before shipping.  It's an irregular one, more suitable for a gift bag than a box.  My tradition of holiday shopping transitioned after marriage.  As a youngster, my parents would get each child one gift and the children would choose one gift for each parent.  My wife's family had a different approach, one quickly adopted by me.  They would arrange for each person to open one token present with each candle.  Our Christian friends would call them stocking stuffers, maybe even less expensive than those.  A candy bar, a handkerchief, a book.  Something nominal each night.

When we married, we engaged in professional training programs that located us about 200 miles from my kin and 300 miles from hers.  It was impractical to get each person eight gifts, so my siblings and father, and hers, followed my tradition of one each for the holidays.  Boston had just begun to experiment with suspension of Blue Laws for the Christmas shopping interval.  I had most Sundays off, and my program gave us a variable holiday to allow a day off to shop for gifts.  Shabbos was never an impediment.  My wife got her eight, as did I.  Downtown Boston had endless retailers, some large, some small, as did Mass Ave in Cambridge.  

Training done, adequately paying jobs secured, permanent housing purchased.  Then expansion of our gift list by children and now grandchildren, with some contraction of parents and sibs.  The single larger presents largely stopped, the smaller gifts for household, or used to be household, continued, now approaching fifty years.

Shopping and shipping have also changed.  Blue Laws lapsed decades ago, leaving Sundays as a day available for whatever people wanted to do, including shopping.  Retailing changed.  Big Box stores and enormous chains dominate the retail landscape.  Those places to get cheap stuff: Zayre, Caldor, Woolworths, are all blessed memories.  Purchasing through e-tailing works well for substantial items, less well for tchotchkes that need shipping to multiple places.  We also no longer have those Main Street gift shops that once provided me with local, small-market craft items.  In its place came periodic craft fairs.  And I expect to travel once or twice a year.  While away, I look for an inexpensive item made locally that I can place in a drawer for a few months on returning home, then ship to a recipient for Hanukkah when the season arises.  My first Hanukkah purchase typically occurs in the summer.

Over fifty years, the transport of items has also changed.  The USPS has largely privatized, now competing with UPS and FedEx.  For my convenience, there are also franchises that will box and ship for me.  I prefer a small operation in a strip mall near me, but there are UPS Stores, Fed Ex, and Staples that make this convenient.  It allows me to bundle each recipient's items and pay a single fee.

But much like fifty years ago, the selection and wrapping remains a pleasurable annual task for me.  With my current recipient list of three young adults, two infants, and a wife, my share comes to 28 presents.  Over the years, I've learned to set categories.  Each can expect an edible, those items that cost a few dollars, come in a package that can be wrapped, and need no refrigeration.  The women can expect a bauble.  Earrings now come in so many variations that it's easy to make a sports team logo or image of a cat dangle from each lobe.  Team swag comes as mugs, clothing, or anything else clever admen can hire artists to create for mass production.  Things handed to my wife with each Hanukkah candle require no weight considerations.  Shipping by rail or air does better with candy, textiles, and jewelry as transport fees correlate with weight.  The shape of the item also matters.  I prefer rectangular that I can gift wrap.  Books, cloth items that can be folded and placed into boxes, either purchased or harvested from boxes of printer ink or k-cups boxes.  I have gift bags, most designed for giving, a few more in the style of a paper bag that can be made more visually appealing with a bow or decal.

Each year I can expect a few unique quirks.  These past two years, my edibles selections seem different.  Since I maintain a kosher diet, I would not gift to somebody else something I would not eat myself.  I think this is part of the ethical basis of our holidays and our personal relationships.  Until two years ago, I could expect a kosher marking on the wrapping of most sweets.  Not so the last two years.  Chocolates and baked products that had been part of my gift purchases for years often lack the certification that I seek.  Most anything made in the Mediterranean countries, Turkey, Greece, Italy, no longer contract with the rabbis.  Nor do the Belgian chocolates I used to give my wife or mail to my kids each Hanukkah.  I do not know why.  It could be innocent reasons like changes in ingredients or manufacturing sharing equipment with non-kosher products.  Or more sinister, countries that no longer want Jewish symbols on their packaging as a political statement.  In any case, the market share of kosher consumers is small enough that omission of the certification will not affect profits.  Or what was once a symbol of quality, divine approval of the product, has become an association of the manufacturers with misconduct.  Either interpretation, the selection of items has contracted for me.  So anything edible now comes from an international conglomerate or an American producer, where kosher remains a stamp of quality.

At the other pole, despite rising prices that have changed voting patterns, the price of logo items has not accelerated.  Stuff carrying local team emblems has proliferated.  So do corporate logos of snob appeal etched into glassware or imprinted on golf balls.  Cosmetics at discounters like T.J. Maxx remain plentiful.  Soaps, lip gloss, facial brushes, creams all remain within acceptable price ranges.  And most come in easily wrappable boxes.

While gift certificates are tempting, I only include one for my wife among my 28 selections.  The holiday should generate a certain gratitude.  Among mine are prosperity not only for myself but for children who each hold professional positions with large employers.  They have and fritter more than the $10 any gift card from me would afford them.  Instead, the challenge for gift selections now and fifty years back has been to assess the uniqueness of each person.  While they could buy themselves anything I might wrap for them, they likely won't.  A son who inherited my fondness for the kitchen can expect something to enhance his experience there.  My ladies who like occasional pampering can expect an indulgence or two among what I purchase on their behalf.  They are the recipients.  As the donor, I get to think about each of them as I move from department to department in a store or from table to table at a craft fair.  What might I run across that is not available to them?  A local craft with the image of their favorite childhood cartoon, a team that dominates where they once lived but has been overwhelmed by the teams of their current cities, an item taken from a vendor from a place I have visited but they have not.  Each person, even the two infants, needs their husband, dad, or grandpa to think about them.  For fifty years, I've given it my best effort.  Some elements now easier than they once were, others more challenging.  As each candle gets its flame for the eight days of Hanukkah, each person will have a moment of glee.  Less the product, more the kinship.