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In case you were wondering, I don’t really need anything for Christmas. When I’m asked, I draw a blank.
So Homer asked me a couple of weeks ago what I wanted. I told her I needed some bras. I would also like some good cheese and anything pickled. As many of you know, I’m a pickle fanatic.
Christmas has been weird for me this year. May be a bit of SAD or that the economy is in the crapper, but I just haven’t been feeling it.

Then yesterday we had our office party for Patsy.

Patsy rolls our newspapers for home delivery. She is roughly 60 years old but has the mind and temperament of a child of roughly 5. She’s worked for the newspaper for several years and comes by bus on Tuesdays and Thursdays from CDS.
Each year, the office throws her a Christmas party. She likes little stuffed animals, socks, hand sanitizer (I didn’t know this until yesterday) and bottles of lotion.
She is always so excited about Christmas and she’s really shy. She calls me TraceTrace, our office manager NellBell and she’s always smiling. Sometimes I’ll go check on her in the insert department and she will hug me, showing me her hands which are usually black and covered in soy ink. Her sister didn’t know about the party and came to take her to lunch yesterday but stayed for the party instead. She gave us some insight about how Patsy must color coordinate everything (thus her need for literally hundreds of socks.) Patsy lived with her mother until she died a couple of years ago.
Another CDS client who happens to be of the boy persuasion sent her roughly 10 presents yesterday including puzzles he had put together and framed for her. Patsy’s face turned beet red. Squirrel Queen smiled and mouthed to me, “She’s embarrassed.”
She was on the front page back in the summer when Jerry Reese came to the center and she mentions it to me all the time although I don’t think she realizes that he is the general manager of the NY Giants. She just likes him. A member of his family is also at the workshop that Patsy is involved in so he comes a couple of times a year to help them raise money. She loves having her picture in the paper and we oblige each year because she usually wins medals at the Special Olympics.
My heart is full this morning as she makes me happy about Christmas every year. Her childlike delight at opening presents. She laughs each time she opens a gift.
I need this more than food each Christmas. Her joy completes me in so many ways.
I have already gotten my Christmas present through her.