Christmas Shopping

"The Season is upon us now, a time for gifts and giving; and as the year draws to its close, I think about my living." So writes John Denver in an ode to his children, A Baby Just Like You. Yesterday was Black Friday, the ominous-sounding beginning of the Christmas shopping season. Though it's hardly the "beginning" anymore -- Christmas candy lines the shelves the day after Halloween and television ads try to induce sentimentality long before the final shiver of Dance Macabre has drifted away.

This year, however, Black Friday lived up to its name as a crowd of shoppers straining and shoving their way into a Long Island Wal-Mart, trampled an employee to death. Very likely no one knew what was happening until it was over or if they did, they couldn't stop or slow down because of the pressure of the mob behind. You know what it's like: you're standing at the gate of a rock concert, the gates open, and then God help you, you're carried along like a twig on a wave. But this time it wasn't Jon Bon Jovi or Cold Play waiting on the other side, it was "buy one, get one free" and "60% off while supplies last."

Has the economy gotten so bad that you take your life in your hands going shopping? Where is our perspective? It seems to me that people become easily impatient lately. You're driving down the highway and someone pulls up behind you. There's plenty of passing room yet they ride close to your bumper and when they've decided you aren't going any faster, swing round, and leave you contemplating a hateful glance or a single-fingered salute. One driver cuts off another, they pull over, fists fly, a gunshot is heard.

Yes, many times alcohol is involved but not every time and not by everyone. I doubt most of the people in the crowd Friday morning had been drinking. A man left his house and went to work, no doubt earlier than most days, and was simply unlocking the doors of the store. He didn't have time to get out of the way.

Crowds do strange things. It's one reason I don't particularly care for them. Whatever factors combined to result in the death of the man on Friday, we do him honor if allow his death to remind us that no one should be simply "in the way." In this season of thinking about our living, thinking about his dying may be one of the more meaningful things we can do.