Stream of Consciousness Saturday

I just sent out my (not quite) monthly newsletter, and it’s time for another Stream of Consciousness Saturday!  Today’s prompt is “consume”.  I am struggling to come up with a fiction start with this in mind.  Of course there is “consume” as in consumer, but it also means to eat.  There are after-Christmas sales right now, and one can also be a consumer of media.  A reader, a computer user, someone who watches TV or movies (even The Interview, a movie that would not have received nearly as much press if Sony had not been hacked and there weren’t threats related to releasing the movie.)

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“Excuse me,” Julie said as she bumped into the stranger.

The stranger glared at her, grabbed the ornament Julie had been reaching for, and stalked off.

Well, I never, Julie thought.  She had bumped into me, and then she acts as if it’s all my fault!

Julie was shopping at Star’s Department store’s after Christmas sale.  The store was packed with women looking for a steal for next year’s Christmas.  This was the first year Julie had a house big enough to store a multitude of Christmas ornaments, and she was planning on making the most of it.  Her shopping cart was already filled with tinsel, a holiday bear collection, and a box full of ornaments.  She planned on looking at the nativity sets next.  After all, Christmas is all about the birth of Christ.

Julie didn’t stop to consider the irony: here she is, purchasing things to hoard, even though Christmas should be about the magic.  Magic of God becoming human.  Magic of Santa Claus. Magic of the decorations and lights in the snow-covered neighborhoods.  Santa Claus!  She needed some Santa Clauses to go with her bears.  Julie pushed her cart away from the crowded ornament bins to the Santa Claus section, and found a variety of jolly old men.  She picked up several in different bold colors; one for each room in the house.  She then picked up a small tree for each bedroom, and lights for the trees and for the outside of the house.

It was only hours later, when the store was closed and she was at home, that she remembered the nativity she had planned to buy.