Pass the gravy and the credit card

What is the most frequent trip most Americans in general take between the early part of November and the end of December?

Answer: the guilt trip.

An entire years' worth of guilt all rolled into one convenient, easy shopping spree that guarantees a great return on the investment as parents watch children open presents they can't afford, siblings re-gift presents from the office White Elephant Christmas party that they really wanted but now pass on because they didn't buy anything, husbands sheepishly hand off a little box to their wives they got the day before Christmas at a convenience store that looks like it is giftwrapped by a drunken elf, wives sitting in the corner smiling as everyone opens presents they purchased for the entire family and finally aunts and uncles gifting highly inappropriate gifts to nieces and nephews which will be thrown away immediately as soon as they drive off after the 2 o'clock dinner is over.

The only entities that win at this time of the year are the credit card processors that charge a convenience fee from 3-5% on every merchant transaction and between 20-40% on every customer's transaction for the privilege of using that piece of plastic to buy everything under the sun because although it is the thought that counts, a 2025 Mercedes is received with a lot more joy than a $3.00 candy bar from Uncle Rosco's convenience store with a side order of greasy, half melted beef jerky stick.

Those of us who try to advance our lives financially to ease the burden ongoing bills cause every month and try to climb our way up the socio-economic ladder a little bit while fighting the stick of reality hitting us in the head and knocking us down a rung every time, we feel like we are finally getting ahead a little, we tend to see this time of the year as the most difficult to budget for and the most difficult to contend with. We see this time of the year as a challenge that we must overcome - the challenge of resisting societal norms to adhere to an increasingly higher and higher level of gift giving every year that breaks our bank and destroys our credit card score by pushing the amount of credit used to stratospheric conditions.

But it wasn't always like this... in America... in the past expectations were more ... demure, more realistic for what gift giving should be. Sure, there were always families that had so much money that they just had to be ostentatious, but the vast majority of American households used to celebrate the holidays with a sense of renewal about life and enjoying the company of their families - with a healthy... very healthy side order of whiskey, rum or whatever choice of alcohol was accessible to them at the time. Because although Christmas is when we used to discover just how utterly nutty and idiotic our family members really are, overall, it was the spirit of the holidays that brought joy from the mundane and the stressful. The Clark W. Griswald moments as it were, bringing all the family together and watch them slowly destroy your house and burn down your tree and cause the storm sewer to blow up and generally cause so much mayhem that you start questioning your sanity but overall, still be able to sit at the dinner table and enjoy a dried-out turkey and genuinely reflect on how happy and lucky your family is to be able to get together and enjoy the holidays in a house held up only by the grace of family love.

But today the Griswalds have been replaced by the Spenders - a family dedicated to maxing out the credit cards in order to impress each other with more and more expensive gifts that will end up being destroyed or thrown away by the time the credit card bill is paid off and next year's Black Friday deal arrives in October sometimes. But again, that wasn't always like that. Even Black Friday wasn't even always like it is today. Even the term Black Friday didn't start out describing shopping or the day when merchants break even for the year or anything like that.

The term "Black Friday" came out of the 1950s Philadelphia era, when police officers, fed up with the rowdy and unruly shoppers who poured into the city, caused all kinds of havoc for law enforcement. Increased crime, shoplifting, traffic, fighting, overcrowding and the Army-Navy football game, put such a strain on the resources the police were able to muster that no officer was ever permitted to take that weekend off and spend Thanksgiving with their families. It came to be a dreaded time for them. So, they started calling it Black Friday - much to the chagrin of merchants who were trying to increase their sales to be able to make as much money as possible. In an effort to counter the negativity the term Black Friday came to mean to many, merchants started calling the day "Big Friday", but the term never caught on and Black Friday was poised to become a disaster. It wasn't until the 1980s when some clever marketing finally turned the term around and people started associating it with deals, shopping and the desire to get discounts on millions of items that were somehow always in a limited supply.

But is Black Friday really such a good idea for consumers? Are merchants really operating in the negative all year until that time? Do you really get a good deal on that day?

First of all, the idea that merchants operate at a loss all year round until Black Friday rolls around is patently false. No merchant would be able to sustain operational capabilities by operating with a net loss for almost 11 months out of the year and no merchant can get enough foot traffic through their doors in a matter of 48-72 hours to compensate for all those losses AND make enough to be able to sustain operations for the next 12 months until next Black Friday comes around.

Second - take a look at the "deals" you are getting on this day. Are they really deals - or did merchants roll out new products they wanted to advertise anyway at a certain price and label them a "deal" to give shoppers the illusion that they are getting something for nothing?

Third. Is Black Friday really a few hours shopping frenzy that we are led to believe it is? It used to be that Black Friday consisted of a few doorbuster deals with merchants used to lure people into their stores to purchase as much stuff as they could in an effort to stock up with Christmas gifts. While trying to compete with each other, merchants would sometimes open earlier than other days - for example, if a merchant normally opened its doors at 7 AM, on Black Friday they might open at 6 and advertise a large discount on a few television sets. Hundreds of people would show up and que in line with the hopes of purchasing a new TV only to find out that those deals were long gone, or the merchant, although has plenty of regular priced TVs in stock, sold out of the bargain priced ones about 1 minute after the doors opened because they only had 20 of them for a crowd of 500. Or they had some new toy every kid wanted and, on that day, alone, from 4 AM to 6 AM that toy had a 20% discount, causing moms everywhere to not only rush the door to the store but get into fights with other moms about some stuffed bear with overalls on. The news would constantly hype up this phenomenon as well by showing people shoving, pushing and fighting each other for some hot item.

The idea of course, was to get people into the stores because even if they couldn't get THAT item, they would get SOME items and merchants were not about to discount those items because they were not on the special list.

As time went on, Black Friday started emerging as an all-out shopping spree - predating the internet age and Amazon. But what started as a few hours rush to spend spend spend, evolved into a half a day event, then an all-day event and then an all-weekend event and now, with the advent of online deals, Black Friday seems to flow into Cyber Monday without missing a beat and continue right on until Christmas Day. Pretty soon, Black Friday will start on November 29th and end the following year on November 27th and start again 2 days later.

But the bottom line is that Black Friday is nothing but another clever marketing hoax that American businesses devised to get consumers to spend ALL their monies and to max out their credit cards. It is nothing but a marketing ploy and we should stop falling for it once and for all.

Rather than giving into it, we should make careful budgetary considerations throughout the year to prepare for a small shopping spree that we can undertake between August and December and really seek out good deals to take advantage off rather than to rush out one day and just buy whatever the retailers tell us they want us to buy. We should be better consumers and better budget conscious individuals and families. At the end of the day, as hokey as it sounds, the holidays really are about one thing, and it is not Black Friday deals.

It is about recognizing the very limited time we, as humans, have with our families on this planet together and to appreciate the time we do spend together and to really just enjoy a small break from work during the holidays and be thankful for the love we have to share with those who are still with us. Including our pets. So put away the credit cards, put away the expectations of increasingly more expensive gifts, don't go on the guilt trip this year and just sit around the dinner table, enjoying that dried up turkey with Aunt Bettany's Jello mold, followed by a few drinks, and then watch the Griswolds blow up Santa's sleigh on TV while cheering for Clark wo get his big bonus to put in a swimming pool even though uncle Eddie can't swim.

And if the relatives get on your nerves, ask for a Tylenol and holy shit, let's play ball.