Ho! Ho! Ho! And a Pregnant Goat!
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"Have you started your Christmas shopping yet, Lisa?" My roommate Lisa and I were packing to go home for break.

"Started and finished as much as I'm doing--as in zilch!"

"Zilch? You're not buying anyone a present?"

"Why would I? I've been telling you all semester that my parents and I are into VS--Voluntary Simplicity. That's close to being the exact opposite of the consumer frenzy you call Christmas." Lisa could get obnoxious on the subject of VS.

"I thought you said VS meant you don't go shopping just for fun. Only when you really need something. And then you try to find it second hand, like a used car or clothes from a thrift shop. But you can't buy used stuff for a gift!"

She sighed. "You'll never understand alternative lifestyles. You're in the same rut as your parents. And grandparents, too, probably. Grow up and think for yourself, why don't you?"

"So when did you ever think for yourself? Always bragging about how smart your parents are. You let them rule your life!" I was steamed, which gave her the edge again, damn it.

"My parents don't push their ideas on me," she said, calm as always. "We all read the alternative press and get information off the web. We discuss international issues at the dinner table. Gets pretty lively sometimes when we have different viewpoints."

That stopped me. My mom never questioned my dad's opinions. I used to try to argue with him back in high school. But he dismissed me as a "snot-nosed kid." Or he'd say that girls can afford to be impractical because they're going to let some man earn the living. For a second I was almost envious of Lisa's weird parents.

"So, back to the subject of Christmas," I said. "Are you saying no one in your family gives anyone else any presents?"

"I wish. But only the three of us are committed to simplicity. My grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins are all strictly conventional, like . . . " She slapped her lips shut before saying "like you." But I felt it, anyway, in her sarcastic glance.

"So how does that work?" I wasn't going to let her get to me again.

"They give us conventional presents, and we give each of their families a pregnant goat."

"You're putting me on!"

"A little." She was grinning now. "We buy a goat in their name through Heifer International. H.I. offers a choice of livestock, like cows or even water buffalos. But goats we can afford. Each goat we buy goes to a family in a developing country. They have to agree to give the first-born kid to another family.

"It's a gift that makes sense to us, because the family really needs it, and they get something they can pass along to others. If Mom and Dad and I keep buying goats year after year, no matter what expensive stuff the others give us, they might catch on and start buying pregnant goats in our name!"

I couldn't think of anything to say. I'd brought up the subject in the first place because I needed some advice about a present for my thirteen-year-old brother. I'd drawn his name and had no idea what to get him. I hadn't been home since I left for Iowa City last August for my freshman year at the U of I, but we'd never been close.

The only other presents I had to buy were for my older sister's kids. Their names weren't in the drawing; everyone got them presents. But kids are easy to shop for. I'd just go to a toy store and find something within my price range.

Junior high boys like sports equipment, probably. I could just buy something in the sports section of a department store. That way I wouldn't have to worry about getting the right size and color of a sweater or something. Whatever. Obviously I couldn't get any good advice from Lisa!

---

 

I got home a few days before Christmas, did my shopping, got the gifts wrapped at the mall and put them under the tree. Christmas morning I got up as soon as I heard Mom in the shower. Dad and Blaine were sleeping in. A year ago I wouldn't have thought anything of it. But Lisa was a radical feminist as well as being into VS, peace and justice issues, and deep ecology.

I started seeing my family through Lisa's eyes. I could imagine how those silver-blue eyes of hers would go cold and her blond eyebrows would arch if she could see Mom and me doing the domestic servitude number while the male power symbols slept.

Thinking of Lisa's blond coloring reminded me of how I'd tried to talk her into using a little mascara and penciling some color on those pale brows to give her eyes more drama. She'd iced me good for that one. I didn't offer her any more of my "conventional suggestions" that came from my being "a sheep doing whatever the TV commercials told me to do." Refusing to use makeup was another of her marks of conspicuous superiority.

I had the cranberry relish almost made and Mom had the rest of the dinner under control by the time Dad and Blaine were up and downstairs. They condescended to put the extra leaves in the dining room table. Then Dad went into the living room to watch TV while Blaine set the table for eight. Karen's family was expected soon.

Mom had made sure everything was perfect and done at the same time. I relaxed finally when we were all seated, grace was said, and food was being passed. I wondered if Lisa's family did the conventional thing with food. And if so who cooked it? Was her dad up at the crack of dawn doing his share? Lisa said her mom wouldn't have married him if he'd been a male chauvinist pig.

I guess that's what she would call Dad and Blaine and Karen's husband Robert. The three of them went off together to the TV after they stuffed themselves. The three of us had to clear the table, load the dishwasher, and keep the peace between two-year-old Robby and six-year-old Jamey.

At least Lisa would approve of the boys being four years apart and Karen only having two kids. Lisa was big into zero population growth. She said the status of women has a lot to do with how many babies are born.

"I wanta pass out presents," Jamey said when dishes were done and we joined the men in the living room.

Robby echoed his brother. "Let Robby help," Karen told Jamey.

"He can't read," Jamie whined.

"I can read the labels for him," I volunteered. So the presents got distributed in relative harmony. Most of us had one; my nephews each had a pile.

"The youngest gets to go first," Mom said. Robby tore open the first package. It was a big plastic police car. He started pushing it around on the floor, making motor sounds.

"Let me show you how it works," Dad said, and demonstrated the remote control and flashing lights, beaming as Robby backed it up using the remote.

"Here, open this present," Mom told Robby, handing him the one from her. He wanted to keep playing with the car, but she insisted. It was a plastic racetrack with little racecars. She helped him put it together and rolled the first car down a slope. Before he was ready to quit playing with it, Robert was after him to open the gift from him.

Meanwhile, Jamey was fussing at Robby to hurry up so he could begin on his own pile. Robby began tearing open packages, looking for a few seconds at whatever was inside, and then reaching for the next one. Surrounded by a pile of wrapping paper, he looked around for something more to open. "Mo' pwesents!"

Karen scolded him for not being happy with all his new toys. Robby climbed up in his grandmother's lap, bawling. Jamey was already tearing into his pile. I guess he'd learned the game, because he just appraised each gift quickly and went for another.

I was totally glad it was really my eyes and not Lisa's seeing this. I could just hear her compare my nephews to the feeding frenzy of sharks. She'd see my whole family as sheep controlled by advertisers. "Consumers!" she'd say with contempt.

Blaine wasn't enthusiastic about the tennis racket and can of balls I gave him. Was he expecting something more expensive? Maybe not. Mom said he spends a lot of time in his room reading. I should have bought him a book.

As I was picking up the ribbons and wrapping paper mess, I heard Jamey in the kitchen whining to Karen. "I didn't get as many presents this year. Last year it was fourteen. This year only eleven, counting the ones from Santa and my other grandma."

"Well, I'm sorry," Karen said in a soothing voice. "Maybe some of the presents this year were more expensive."

Boy, would Lisa make a big deal out of that little exchange! I could just hear her analysis: You're teaching greed! What do you expect but gimme-gimme-gimme?

Suddenly I realized that this was not Lisa's analysis, but mine. Those Voluntary Simplicity nuts could be on to something. How 'bout them pregnant goats!