The Holiday Season

The Thanksgiving holiday is upon us. And with that comes the day after ("Black Friday")which kicks off the Christmas buying period. In my 32 years of life I have never went out on Black Friday and shopped, but this year I am looking at this day as well as the holidays in general a little different. For a very long time I have felt that the holidays for the most part no longer carry their original meaning. Now they are a tool of Capitalism. It is what it is and its up to the individual to determine how much they spend and get involved in this aspect of the holiday. However this year being that I have been taking this class and now work in a new industry I am seeing things a bit different.
At work all see all the trucks bring in food products among other things. That's a lot of trucks a ton of diesel fuel and lots of stuff from far away places. I now kind of see it as a waste. We are consuming a lot of extra energy on top of what we use on a day to day basis just to increase the amount of product brought in to accommodate a few day of "Big Eating" and one day of opening presents during the holidays. I see how much fuel the trucks use for normal daily capacity and now we are working at more than double the volume for basically one or two days of family dinners. It doesn't really seem worth it to me.
As far as Christmas and all the toy gift buying/giving, all I can thing about is how much fuel it took to make and get those goods to our hands. It brings back thoughts of the video we watched on our very first class. Also as Folbre pointed out the fact that caring gets lost in the shuffle. Think of all the people who are being exploited in some way shape or form in countries like China, just so we can go to Walmart and get everything on every ones wish list. Most of the stuff is junk anyway and will end up in a land fill harming the environment anyway.
I look at my children's Christmas want lists, then I walk by their rooms and see all the crap they already have most of which is on the floor and I say what the hell have I done. Most of the stuff my 9 year old wants is cheap crap made over seas. I have to say that this year the holidays for me have a very different feel, perspective and realization. Just something to think about! Happy Holidays to all!