Fred Frederikse: And a grandpa in a grinch tree

Fred Frederikse Photo/File

Being a practising non-monotheist means that I try not to get caught up in monotheist festivals, but to take it in good grace when they are unavoidable.

This year I even found myself singing Christmas carols with the Community Education Service (CES) ukulele orchestra while being towed down Victoria Ave on a trailer. It was for a good cause (CES that is, not Christmas consumerism).

I don't give Christmas presents so on Christmas Day, to cover my embracement at being the grinch in the room, as the family opened their presents to one another I read out some sections from Guardian columnist George Monbiot's collected columns: How did we get into this mess? (Verso 2016), the book I happened to be reading at the time.
"Listen to this," I said as my grandchild ripped the paper from a present.

"They seem amusing on the first day of Christmas, daft on the second, embarrassing on the third. By the twelfth they are in landfill. For 30 seconds of dubious entertainment, or a hedonistic stimulus that lasts no longer than a nicotine hit, we commission the use of materials whose impacts will ramify for generations."

The grandchild's parents remonstrated that the second-hand Thomas the Tank Engine wooden train set that they had bought for him on Trade Me was recycled, not made of plastic, and, if cared for, this collector's item could go another round some day and possibly increase in value.

I had to admit that it was pretty impressive and the grandson was delighted with it.
Monbiot was on a roll though, claiming that of the materials flowing through the consumer economy, because of planned obsolescence (breaking quickly) and perceived obsolescence (becoming unfashionable), only 1 per cent of items remain in use six months after sale.

"The fatuity of the products is matched by the profundity of the impacts. Rare materials, complex electronics, the energy needed for manufacture and transport are extracted and refined and combined into compounds of utter pointlessness ... we are screwing the planet to make solar-powered fairy lights and individual beer can chillers. When every conceivable want and need has been met (among those with disposable money), growth depends on selling the utterly useless," I continued reading, feeling a little preachy by this stage.

The family was beginning to tire of Monboit's Marxist environmentalism and they suggested that I might like to make myself useful by making everyone a cup of tea and doing the breakfast dishes.

"So effectively have governments, the media and advertisers associated consumption with prosperity and happiness that to say these things is to expose yourself to opprobrium and ridicule. When the world goes mad, those who resist are denounced as lunatics," I shouted from the kitchen, quoting Monboit.

"Don't make my tea too strong," someone replied.

A good columnist can make you reflect and while doing the dishes I contemplated the concluding lines of Monboit's column, cuttingly titled: The Gift of Death.

"Bake them a cake, write them a poem, give them a kiss, tell them a joke, but for god's sake (Monboit writes god with a small G) stop trashing the planet to tell someone you care. It all shows you don't."

Not giving a present on Christmas Day could be perceived as not caring I concluded; I decided to do something about that and after lunch sat down and did a drawing.
It was of a view of the Hastings racecourse from their lounge.

From an early age my grandson has been infatuated with tractors so I drew him into the picture on a tractor mowing the racecourse grass and I put the Pipster into the foreground to give the drawing depth.

When I ripped it out of my sketchbook and gave it to my grandson I could tell by the look on his face it was a big hit.

"Me on Allis," he beamed, pointing to the tractor (he knows his tractors).
Later in the afternoon his cousin came round for more ritual exchanges of plastic. "Racecourse," he said, recognising the view when my grandson proudly showed him his drawing.

"Pipi," he said pointing to the dog, "an' me on tractor," he pointed.

"No me on tractor," replied my grandson. "No me on tractor." "No me." "Me."

"No me," it went until I had two 3-year-old boys howling their eyes out. They had both missed their midday sleep.

I was just trying to show I cared and it all ended in tears.

When Fred Frederikse is not making little boys cry, he is a self-directed student of geography and traveller. In his spare time he is co-chairman of the Whanganui Musicians Club.