A Christmas Letter to Martha Stewart

(Written by the author in 2002)

Dear Martha Stewart:

My wife recently received the December 2002 issue of your magazine, "Martha Stewart Living," and after leafing through its 324 pages of ads, cookie recipes and pictures of how-our-house-could-never-look, I want to express my concern.

The other day, my wife received a letter from a lady who wrote, "I am contemplating how to get through the Christmas holidays without a migraine like I had last year. I think I’ll have a personal Christmas early and pretend it’s not Christmas when it really comes."

Perhaps, Martha, in your well-meaning way, you are contributing to the kind of stress that lady feels. Most folk have enough to do during the Christmas season without wanting to be reminded that they could be busy making soap, creating pomegranate punch or stenciling holly leaf images on linen.

By the way, my wife has too many doodads sitting around already, and with my taste for minimalism, we have a recipe for domestic in-tranquility. (Here’s the recipe: Keep adding doodads to a small living room until someone is stirred to the boiling point.)

The singer Madonna has been labeled "the material girl," but I’m afraid, dear Martha, that she can’t hold a candle—and that would be a handmade candle, of course—to you, when it comes to materialism. And that’s not a good thing.

In your magazine, you included an article entitled "A Letter from Martha."

"Well," I thought, "maybe the handmaiden of handicrafts has written a little story, telling of some happy childhood Christmas experience."

But no.

You wrote: "This year we are launching our beloved, gigantic collection of holiday decorations from Martha Stewart Everyday…Now everyone can have ‘vintage’ ornaments, unusual tree lights, color-coordinated trees, fantastic wreaths and candles, and much more. I urge you to take a peek."

Sorry, Martha, I won’t be peeking. We have plenty of "vintage" Christmas stuff cluttering our closets already.

I suggest that you throw a bit of Thoreau in amongst whatever, besides cookbooks, that you read. Henry David Thoreau once said, "A man is rich in proportion to the things he can do without."

Think on that, Martha, while you are basting a turkey, rooting around for rutabagas or creating collectibles.

Actually, I believe that you have many fine qualities, but you remind me of another Martha.

It seems that Jesus – the one this Christmas holiday honors – was acquainted with two sisters named Mary and Martha.

Martha invited Jesus and his disciples to dinner at her and her sister’s home, and when the men arrived, Martha rushed into action in the kitchen, preparing and serving. But when she noticed that her sister Mary was sitting and listening to Jesus, she said, "Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her to help me."

No doubt Martha was the worrying type. Perhaps she was the older sister and wanted to whip up a Martha Stewart-type dinner with everything just perfect for the Lord. If they had been blessed with TV back in those days, perhaps Sister Martha would have been glued to the Martha Stewart "From the Kitchen" program every time it aired. Maybe Martha had often told Mary, "Busy hands are happy hands." Perhaps Martha equated busyness with godliness.

Anyway, when she confronted Jesus with Mary’s seeming negligence of duty, Martha may have thought Jesus would put a guilt trip on Mary and get her moving.

But Jesus said, "Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things…Mary has chosen the good portion, which shall not be taken away from her."

So, dear Martha Stewart, though you are creative and industrious, lay aside your spatula and mixing bowl for a little quiet time before you get all whipped into a frenzy during this wondrous time of year.