I got a Christmas catalog yesterday

L.L. Bean's Christmas 2005 catalog arrived in our post office box yesterday. That's a record, I think. I'm not sure I like getting a Christmas catalog in September. There's something sad, even grasping, about Christmas gift hawking this early in the year. Not that many people don't already have their Christmas buying already taken care of for the year, for all intents and purposes - some people are always on the look-out for potential gifts, it seems like - and others are obviously starting to gear up and buy things to beat the rush. It's just that folks who know how to shop early don't seem to need the nudge, and maybe the rest of us would like to keep the holiday season more contained? Or maybe I mean we'd like to keep it feeling set apart from the rest of the year? I know I would.

At any rate, I opened the post office box and saw I had a catalog touting itself as a Christmas catalog, and my heart sank a little. And I love Christmas catalogs. It's just too early for this. Isn't it? I savor seasonal differences, each thing in its own time. Is it too much to ask that we get Halloween out of the way before we move on to Christmas? Or, failing that, maybe Columbus Day? Or the first day of autumn, for pity's sake? They couldn't wait for that, at least?