Postcrossing Favorites for December

Here are this month's favorite postcards received via Postcrossing.com:

From China

From Japan

(See http://myturntodayyourstomorrow-cheryl.blogspot.com/2010/07/postcrossing.html for details about Postcrossing.com.)

Killing Santa

My grandson is 25 now, but each Christmas he lovingly reminds me of how I damaged his little 6-year-old psyche by informing him that Santa Claus wasn't real. 

(I thought he already knew--or at least suspected--and was looking for confirmation.)

Note: The writer of the essay below received many responses in the "comments" section, ranging from "Wow, what a breath of fresh air this essay is" to "Someone is getting a lump of coal in her stocking." Most of the comments were from outraged Pollyannas who obviously didn't get the point she was making.

From The Chronicle of Higher Education: 
"It’s Time for Santa to Go" by Laurie Fendrich 
December 19, 2010

     In 1897, 8-year-old Virginia O’Hanlon wrote to The New York Sun inquiring if Santa Claus were real. In what would become one of the world’s most famous editorials, the Sun lied to her. 

     Here, in part, is what the editorial said:

Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus. It would be as dreary as if there were no VIRGINIAS. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.
Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies!

     What a disservice to humanity—not to mention to the child who asked for the truth. And to what end? To preserve raw, cheap sentimentality. 

     A world without Santa would be no more dreary than the world is with him right now.  Nor would his absence harm childlike faith, poetry, or romance. On the contrary, if Santa Claus and his coterie of reindeer and elves were suddenly to go poof, the holiday season—a happy time for the already happy, but frequently a miserable time for those who are less than happy—would offer people of all faiths, or no faith at all, a much better shot at finding a bit of love, generosity, devotion, beauty, and joy than they can ever find while Santa lives.

     Born centuries ago, from the union of paganism and Christianity, today’s Santa is fully backed by an adult conspiracy that ranges from parents and teachers to NORAD (the North American Aerospace Defense Command, which has been “tracking” Santa’s movements since 1955).  

     Santa is about terror, not love (anybody else ever had to hold ascreaming child who’s refusing to sit on the lap of the man in the red suit?), and he’s about greed, not generosity. If it weren’t for the blustering blinders imposed by “tradition,” we’d have come to our senses and gotten rid of him a long time ago.

     The 19th-century Santa was invented in 1862 by Thomas Nast for Harper’s Weekly. A jolly fat fellow, the first, full-blooded American Santa couldn’t keep from loving children. Nast’s Santa has long since disappeared, replaced by a bearded bully who’s pumped full of capitalist adrenalin, with a modus operandi that stimulates artificial desires in children and stirs feelings of guilt in their parents.

     Our 21st-century Santa boxes parents into a corner, from where they either give in to their children’s materialist cravings or feel at risk of losing their affections. To children, he offers the all-or-nothing proposition that they’re either entirely good or entirely bad—nothing in between. He insidiously substitutes vice for virtue, teaching that goodness is never a good in itself but a mere bartering tool for material goods. As for that fatuous grin, the man is downright dangerous—a pervert possessing the demonic power to ferret out what children are doing even when no one is looking. On top of this, he’s the cruelest of teases, beckoning millions of poor children whose parents lack enough money to live up to his reckless promises.Where the 19th-century Santa handed out a couple of oranges and chocolates, our 21st-century Santa passes out millions of dollars worth of violent video games, iPhones, iPods, and “back to basics” Barbies such as the one now nicknamed “Busty Barbie.” 

     In the strangest, cobbled-together, irrational non-story ever concocted, Santa somehow merges with, but at the same time remains separate from, the Christian story of the baby Jesus. (Although I don’t have a dog in this fight, I thoroughly understand why devout Christians would be appalled at the way Santa trumps the Christian message.) Finally, let it not be forgotten that for parents who are not Christian, or Christian parents who don’t want to play along, Santa offers nothing but headaches.

     Because believing in Santa is doomed to come to a crashing halt, children eventually find out that their parents lied to them. Not that children think this exact thought, or think it when they first learn there’s no Santa. At that moment, they’re more likely to worry that with the jig up, the presents will end. But while parents are thinking of Santa as a small fib whose purpose is to bring happiness to their children, children aren’t making that distinction. The lesson that lingers is that parents lie even to their own children.

     If Santa were to go away, the world would be a better place. Christians could return to telling their story of the Christ child, and non-Christians could turn to Aesop’s Fables or other ancient tales or tales from faraway places. 

     But Santa’s the type who will never leave on his own. No way. He needs killin’.

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One comment contained a link to a Santa-related website, with the following caution:

"I was surprised at how creepy Santa can be when you make a video using this web site:  http://www.portablenorthpole.tv   Upload a picture or two, disclose a few facts about the recipient, and 'poof' you get a customized video that makes Santa appear like a cross between a stalker and The Godfather!  Even my 9-year-old said 'That was spooky' after watching his video."


I went to the website, and the kid is right: it is "spooky," but it's also funny (in a creepy way), so I wound up sending several slightly-snarky video greetings to friends and family members.

Choose Wisely, Grasshopper!

What's more fun than sharing your hobby with someone new?

Today, Tinnam, the 8-year-old daughter of a friend, came over to learn how to make a decorative window from salvaged glass. 

While her mother played Mah Jongg with friends in the kitchen, Tinnam and I set about crafting a small version of the windows I make (see my "Encore Glass" blog for examples). 

After learning how to handle the glass safely, Tinnam had several choices to make.  She selected a weathered black frame and a variety of glass pieces: tiles, craft stones, and pieces of broken plate. I wasn't surprised when she chose blue as her primary color.  Her name means "blue" in Chinese. 

Tinnam's first inclination was to use each piece of glass according to what it represented ("This one looks like a cloud; this one like a flower."), and she soon saw the value in letting the glass cooperate in the design process. 

I joined the players in the kitchen for a round or two of Mah Jongg while Tinnam experimented with structured and free-form designs.

Ultimately, she achieved a balance between the two.

Once her window was assembled, she carefully glued each piece into place.  

I helped with a few final gluing details and then showed her how to put the hanging hardware on the frame.

The artist looks pleased with her work!

Balloons, Cake, and...Insults?

Last weekend, I attended back-to-back birthday parties. Normally, that's my idea of a perfect weekend: cake, games, cake, laughs, cake, presents, cake...well, you get the idea.
This time, however, there was something unsettling about the experience. The two birthday celebrations were very different, and I still feel faintly disoriented. 


One birthday (for the year-old daughter of friends) was fairly traditional. The kids ran around the room, chattering, dancing, playing with toys, etc. The adults kept a careful eye on the toddlers, ate cake, took pictures, and chatted quietly. 


The birthday girl was socially gracious. She exhibited a keen interest in each guest, shared her toys, and gave the occasional high-five, which I deduced is her polite (and effective) way of warding off those who would try to pick her up.

There was a flannel story board.  Balloons. Guests danced the Limbo.  No babies cried, and fun was had by all.

The other birthday celebration took the form of a roast for 50-year-old Ray, a man with a huge extended family and a large circle of friends, co-workers, and acquaintances. 
Ray is  a person who could be politely described as a "character," although other epithets were employed during the evening's festivities.
The roast was emceed by Ray's brother, Kelly, a local radio personality, who began by welcoming the approximately 75 guests and then questioning the parentage of the birthday honoree: 
"Today is Ray's birthday, and he just found out he's adopted. He's actually the love child of Gene Simmons and Richard Simmons."
Here, I attach a photo of the birthday boy, who does, indeed, resemble these two putative fathers.

Ray's ethnicity was disparaged (he is half Danish, half Mexican): "Ray thinks he's Mexican, but he's really a white boy. In fact, Ray's so white, they had to come up with a new name for his color: Rayonnaise." 

Then came a long and horrifying account of the childhood tortures Ray allegedly inflicted on his two younger brothers. Each story was topped in grotesquerie by the one that followed it. 

No sooner did one roaster abandon the microphone than another jumped up to take his/her place, a procession that included Ray's girlfriend, bandmate, boss, workout buddy, uncles, cousins, and perhaps even a couple of passers-by who decided to jump in just for the heck of it. No aspect of Ray's life was off limits. 

Even his mother joined in, claiming that Danish gnomes had exchanged Ray at birth. 






As Ray's former mother-in-law, I regret to say that I joined the chorus, presenting him with this card...

...which was inscribed, inside: "ONE OF US IS AN ASSHOLE." 
But, I did apologize for plotting to shoot Ray many years ago, and I thanked him for helping create my beloved grandson, Kelly.  

When the guests were finally exhausted, Ray took the stage, and he gave as good as he had received. 
The one shred of political correctness I have left from that evening prevents me from repeating most of his retorts. I can tell you that Ray claimed his mother needed "14 cigarettes and 40 cups of coffee" each morning before she would feed her children. "She had cigarettes in every orifice of her body," he said. 
The kindest jab was aimed at Ray's brother, Darrin. Ray claimed that Darrin was "sneaky," so sneaky that, for years, the family didn't even know if he was a boy or a girl, due to his long, blond hair.

To my amazement, no one got angry, punched someone, or stormed out of the room.  Quite the reverse.  People clapped, cheered, and laughed until the tears came.  Upon leaving, everyone hugged everyone and affirmed that it was the best evening they'd shared in years. 

No babies cried, and fun was had by all. 

Pocatello Co-op's 2010 Winter Festival: Happy Faces All Around

Thanks to customers and vendors, alike, the sale was a success! I had fun meeting new people and talking with people I hadn't seen in a while, and I sold more than half of the windows I'd taken with me to the sale. Thanks, also, to all the friends who stopped by to say "hi" and wish us well.
Visit a gallery of my work at: http://encoreglass.blogspot.com.
Here's my display:

And here are the other vendors with their wares:

See what a good time we're having?

Pocatello Co-op's 2010 Winter Festival Sale

Today is the first day of the Pocatello Co-op's "Winter Festival" arts & crafts sale. About 20 local artists and crafters (including moi) will be participating, offering items ranging from clothing and jewelry to stationery, hand-crafted wooden boxes, decorative glass, food, and pretty much anything else you can imagine. 
     The sale is a great place to not only buy a gift for someone (or to treat yourself), but also to talk with the artists and crafters about their work. It's a very relaxed, friendly environment, with no "hard sell" vibe to it at all.
     Below are a few of the windows I'm taking to the sale. Visit a gallery of my work at: http://encoreglass.blogspot.com.

This 18"x32" piece includes glass snowflake ornaments.

20"x24"

This 12"x36" piece includes ocean glass and shells from the Atlantic coast side of Florida.

     In addition to the larger pieces (above), I made several smaller pieces (shown below), because they often sell faster than the large ones. 

10"x12

 7"x9"

This 6"x8" piece is made with glass replica candies and a broken candy dish given to me by a friend. As much as I like to smash glass, I found myself wishing that this beautiful green dish was intact.