The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1913-11-25
DOROTHY DIX GIVES ADVICE ON THE
PURCHASING OF SENSIBLE XMAS GIFTS

Dost realize, beloved sisters, that
the Christmas tide is almost upon us,
and the joyous season hath arrived
wherein we must grapple once more
again yet with the Christmas gift
problem?
In former times Christmas didn't
come but once year, but now, with
all the rest Of modern improvements,
it comes three or four times year.
Or, at any rate, it seems to; but that
is beside the question. The main point
is that it has rolled around again, and
before you can say scat it will be
Christmas again.
Hence l am writing these few lines
to urge you to go and do your Christ
mas shopping right away. Don't put
it off. Begin on it today, while the
shops are comparatively empty, before
the sales girls are worn and harried
until they are reduced to bundles of
nerves and temper, and while you are
still in command of your own sane
senses.
Don't put off buying your Christmas
gifts until the week before Christmas,
when you, and million other women,
will be afflicted with Dementia Christ
masana, and go running around in
circles in the department stores, beat
ing your head against the counters
any crying out: what shall I get for
my husband, and my son, and my
daughter, and my mother, and my
father, and my sister, and my brother,
and my in-laws-drat 'em, any way
and for Uncle John and Aunt Sally.
and Cousin Sue, and the people across
the street whom I've got to send some
thing to-"
And you won't be able to remember
a single fad or fancy, or taste, or in
clination, or habit, or occupation of a
single human being you know. And
you'll go home and have nervous pros
tration, and give it to the clerks, and
wish you had joined the Spugs and
saved your money and your clothes
and your time and the wear and tear
on your disposition.
Now, I am one of those who believe
in Christmas giving. 1t is joy to tbs
generous to give, and it is salutary fol-
the stingy to be made to give up at
least once a year. But the thing that
makes Christmas season of torment
and woe and that leaves US feeling as
if we had been run through stone
crusher is because we don't begin our
preparations in time, and because we
don't bring any common sense to bear
on the proposition.
Wherefore l urge, entreat, implore
and otherwise request you to bear In
mind your own comfort, and the GOOD
of that brave little army of working
women, the sales girls, and do your
shopping early. It's time to show
that you are a real big sister who
feels for the little sister behind the
counter.
Then about the Christmas gift it
There were silly gift books, with
padded backs and fine pictures that
cost $40 or SIS, and that nobody ever
looks at a second time; there were
lamps that cost SIS or $40, when your
home is flooded with electric lights;
there were table centers that cost S.
and scarfs that cost So and 81, and
imitation Japanese vases that cost 81
and So, and so on-enough money
thrown away in things that were alb
solutely useless to you to have bought
something worth while, if only you
could have pooled it all, and if people
had thought it proper to have sent you
rs cents or dollar and half OF
whatever their gift cost.
As for children, always give money
if you want to make the little folks
doubly happy. For one thing, no
grown-up in these days knows what a
child wants, and in the second place
the fun that children have out of going
shopping with the money gives them
10 times the excitement and pleasure
that any gift could afford of itself.
/ used to wear myself to FRAGILE
buying presents for children, but /
don't do it any more. / send them
the money and they invariably buy
something that ! wouldn't have