Full Hearts

'Tis the season for all things excessive and unsettling. Wild-eyed shoppers scurry around on Black Friday, hoping to score the perfect gift at the perfect price. Beleaguered cooks trudge behind squeaky grocery carts, picking up enough items to feed the masses. Worried grandparents peruse wish lists, praying the selected gifts will forever please the grand recipients. Guilt-ridden hosts and hostesses absorb Pinterest suggestions as if their very salvation is dependent upon such things. And Amazon smiles all the way to the bank.

Despite our tendency to gravitate toward shiny objects of desire, there is still goodness to be found. Teaching in a middle school affords me the opportunity to peer into the worlds of my students. Most afternoons, after the final bell rings, a gaggle of students rendezvous in my room. They chatter amongst themselves about school, music, friends and all things teenage. They allow me to eavesdrop on their conversations, providing me with greater insight into their lives.

Luis is often one of the group members. He is round-faced with a pair of glasses perched upon his chubby cheeks. He has a kind heart and loves to show his appreciation by sharing a quick hug and a thank-you. At the start of football season, he told the group that his family didn't have enough money to purchase the kind of shoes he needed for the games. The other group members nodded their heads in commiseration with Luis. They know all about trade-offs and what it means to go without. They don't wear the newest clothes or carry the latest smartphones. They walk home rather than wait for big SUVs to pull up and give them rides. They don't spend time at a lake cabin in the summer and they certainly don't take a week off school in the winter for a trip to Turks and Caicos. By the standards of some, they are not part of the cool crowd.

If we are perfectly honest with ourselves, we probably all have times when we yearn for a membership in the cool club. Marketers know all about this. Pop-up ads remind us of the new jacket that could be ours with a click of a button. Fitbits are replaced by smartwatches. Jeans go from bootcut to skinny to faded to ripped, depending on the year. Spinach loses out to kale and chip dip slides over for hummus. The voices in our head scream, "Not enough, not enough."

When the group asked him what he was going to do about the shoe problem he told them that it had already been taken care of. He said, "My dad sold his music CDs so he could get some money to buy me new shoes." And then he proudly stated, "And that's how I know my dad loves me."

Perfect gifts, meals and decorations be damned. All it really takes is someone who cares.

Disaster

Two weeks ago, to the day, a disaster struck my world. It was not a tornado, no little dogs were whooshed into the air. It was not a blizzard, no toes lost in the process. And it was not a broken hip, no surgery needed. It happened in a split second and in that moment there was no turning back. "Oh, noooooo!" was audibly gasped. (There may or may not have been other vocabulary words used, but I have no proof.) Needless to say, my blood pressure spiked and heart palpitations ensued.

My disaster was the loss of all my cellphone contacts. The context for such folly is neither here nor there. Suffice it to say, I am an idiot and my quest to clean up another tech problem with my phone resulted in a bad move.

As I tried to console myself with possible "it-could-have-been-worse" scenarios, I realized I am moving into a world of fewer and fewer hard copy lists of people, places and phone numbers. Gone are the days of a phone book. My tattered, battered and stained address book (my lifeline years ago) is used less and less. The memorization of phone numbers has gone the way of the spelling bee. Physical calendars are replaced with digital organizers capable of sending reminders to us, electronically of course.

And yet, my feet continue to plod along in the old world, too. I still have a family calendar posted on my refrigerator. It serves as a visual beacon for upcoming events such as recycling pick-ups, Schwan's deliveries and dentist appointments (clearly, my life is free of glamour). I have pads of paper and little notebooks scattered throughout my house and work spaces just in case an idea or reminder needs to be taken care of. I copy recipes from the internet for three reasons: I am too cheap to buy a new printer; sticky, greasy fingers and digital devices do not mix and writing down a recipe forces me to commit to its execution. I have a landline because I prefer to hold something that fits the shape of my gripping hand when I am talking to my friends and family. I tell the sweet little clerk at my local retail center, "No, I don't have your app. Just, well, just because." I like to touch a blanket in a real store before I purchase it. I look at clocks rather than look for my phone to check the time. I prefer to let music bathe over me in a room rather than use little pluggy things in my ears. And I am not sure if my only friend needs to be Alexa.

All that said, I am committed to having a cellphone and I need my contact list. Fortunately, I kept my previous dinosaur of a cellphone and was able to do a phone-to-phone transfer of my contact list. I am sure the average 10-year-old could have completed said process in ten minutes. I will spare you the agonizing details of how long it took me. Just the same, I am patting myself on the back for an electronic disaster being thwarted and note to self, look before you leap.

Address Book, circa 1976