Joys, Pains of 11th-Hour Shopping

Finished your Christmas shopping? No? Don’t feel guilty. Plenty of others haven’t--and are proud of their procrastination.

With gridlocked freeways, packed parking lots and shopping centers swollen with crowds, it’s finally beginning to look like Christmas--Southern California-style.

Elizabeth Villarreal of Westminster gleefully said she won’t complete her shopping till the stores close Christmas Eve.

“People are more cheerful this time of year,” a beaming Villarreal said while doing last-minute shopping Monday. “People say, ‘Merry Christmas,’ and the clerks are more courteous.

“I’m from Chicago where people get the Christmas spirit right after Thanksgiving. Here in California, it takes people a long time to get into the holiday spirit. I didn’t get the feeling that people were happy about the holidays till today.”

Besides, this was the best time for bargains, Villarreal said as she darted among the 75 stores in Huntington Center mall in Huntington Beach. Three weeks ago she happened unto a beaded blouse she wanted but waited for the price to come down from $99.

“When I went into Penney’s this morning, sure enough, the price had come down to $29!” said Villarreal, 42, an office clerk. “I got three of them. My husband’s going to kill me when he finds out. But they’re so beautiful and such a bargain.”

She described herself as “completely at ease” wading through jostling throngs with her 5-year-old daughter Bambi in tow, clutching three large bags of gifts for her other children, Tony, 18, Cindy, 17, and Windy, 15.

Psychotherapists say that people procrastinate about Christmas shopping for both healthy and unhealthy emotional reasons.

“There’re a lot of people who say shopping just before Christmas is fun,” said Beverly Frager, a Santa Ana College psychologist. “They get a thrill out of the excitement of the last few days. They find the festive spirit contagious.”

Markdowns Sure to Come

Dr. Louis A. Gottschalk, professor of psychiatry at UC Irvine’s College of Medicine, said some people put off holiday shopping until the last minute because they can’t resist the merchandise markdowns taking place in the final days before Christmas.

“Then there are people with deeper emotional conflicts who make themselves miserable by putting off Christmas shopping,” Gottschalk said. “At one level, it is nothing more than an inability to decide what they want to get for somebody.

“But those with more deep-seated problems resist getting gifts until they absolutely have to because they’re ambivalent about expressing their love through giving. It’s either because they feel self-conscious about showing how much they care about someone or because they actually aren’t fond of the person, be it an unloved mother-in-law or boss.”

Unhappy procrastinators put off shopping until they feel Dec. 25 breathing down their necks.

“It’s a pain to get out and fight the crowds and traffic around Christmas,” said Cal State Fullerton psychologist John Douglas Liverpool. “Christmas shopping is something that can be put off painlessly till the last minute; then it becomes painful.

“Most of us don’t procrastinate doing pleasurable things. But there are just people who tend to procrastinate in everything they do. It makes no difference whether it’s buying gifts for a happy event like Christmas or buying a wreath for an unhappy event like a funeral.”

‘I Dread It So Much’

Patricia Gregory, 29, a psychiatric technician, readily acknowledged that she is a last-minute shopper. “I dread it so much, what with the crowds and all.”

“And bringing us along,” volunteered her 5-year-old son Ryan, as he impishly pointed to his brother Jason, 7, and sister Allison, 14 months.

“Yes, with children, shopping’s kind of hard,” Gregory admitted good-naturedly. She and her three children were standing in a line slowly snaking its way up to a jolly Santa Claus in the main court of Huntington Center mall.

“Every year, I just seem to run out of time,” Gregory said. “I guess I don’t plan well or use my time wisely.”

This year, it was supposed to have been different because she had started shopping before Thanksgiving. But then she and her husband bought a new house, and she had to oversee their move from Huntington Beach to Fountain Valley.

And next year?

“I just found out I’m going to have another baby, so I guess you’ll find me here this time next year. . . . This is crazy. Somebody get a gun and stop me!”

Though Monica Charpentier, 26, a Westminster homemaker, had dressed her 6-month-old son Shaun in a new red outfit to have his first picture taken with Santa, she said she wasn’t thrilled being out and about with Christmas just around the corner.

“It’s too much of a hassle, and it’s too crowded. I probably won’t finish buying things till Christmas Eve,” said Charpentier as she rested an oversize bag in an empty stroller. Meanwhile, a smiling Shaun bounced gently in the arms of his great-aunt, Yvonne Roosen, 45, an assembly-line worker from Garden Grove.

“I keep telling myself that I won’t put off things till the last minute, but every year I do,” Charpentier said.

Finding Joy

Most shoppers pushing the Christmas deadline at the Huntington Center mall, however, said they were enjoying it.

“Waiting till the last minute gets you in the holiday spirit,” said Roberta Magruder, 59, a homemaker from Thousand Oaks. She was helping her daughter, Suzanne Sansone, 39, of Westminster, and granddaughter Janee, 10, “get some stuff to match up other gifts we’ve gotten already.”

Diane Clark, 51, a secretary from Long Beach, said she normally completes her shopping earlier but had been taking care of her two young grandchildren because her daughter had given birth to a third child a week ago Tuesday.

However, she agreed with her friend Marlene O’Hare, 53, a secretary from Long Beach, who said, “I think with the hustle and bustle of shopping these last days before Christmas, everybody gets into the spirit of things more.”

Upstairs at an open-air eatery, Greta Gonzalez sipped a soda. On the table sat a tray filled with small African violets, while at her feet lay bags filled with gifts for her family.

Gonzalez, 20, of Garden Grove said she had been unable to complete her shopping earlier because she had been busily balancing classes at Golden West College and working as an aide at a nursing home.

But she also sheepishly confessed: “I like the rush of things just before Christmas. I like being around loads of people.”