Dec. 25, 2005: ‘Blues, Reds find peace’

I‘m rather like those Black Friday shoppers at Wal-Mart. I start out with a gift list for everybody else, but wind up discovering what I want instead.

It happened again last week, right on schedule. I was shopping online when my eyes glanced at the calendar hanging from the wall behind my computer. That homemade calendar was my favorite gift from last Christmas, specially designed for our family by my mother.

She and my dad culled their family photo albums and the diaries they’ve saved over the years for endearingly goofy photos and wacky moments of our shared family history.

To understand this gift, here’s what you need to know.

As a family, the only real disadvantage my siblings and I can claim would be strictly geographic. We grew up in a red state not far from one of Tom Brokaw’s early haunts, and we can’t see that it hurt him any. Yet we each frequently meet people whose idea of witty cocktail party chatter involves a round of ridicule of our home state and all of our friends and relatives there.

My sister has devised a jerk-o-meter based on that very tendency. When she meets someone who finds out where she’s from and immediately begins South Dakota-bashing, she makes a mental note: He’s flunked.

You also should know this: We were a collection of baby boomers who grew up with a Republican dad, a partner in his public accounting firm. Gray suits hung in his closet, but it was his fishing vest that made him beam. Our church lady mom harbored both a sense of humor and the discipline to herd her four goofball children into one of the front pews at the local First Presbyterian Church each Sunday. Our prairie ancestors were homesteaders, but we grew up in a 1960s split level in our small city, and we spent sunny weekends at a summer cabin in the Black Hills.

Into our parents’ diaries fell the saga of four kids with highly individual personalities, a series of dysfunctional family pets, scattered weather reports and a smattering of the politics and religion that defined our family life. If these entries didn’t make us chuckle the day they occurred, they certainly held that power years later.

Start with January. The entries are written mostly as headlines. They begin with Jan. 5, 1981, on the birth of the first grandchild, followed by Jan. 6, 1970, devoted to my mom’s highlight: “Marlene drives into garage door.”

There’s Jan. 11, 1975, “Wind chill factor minus-60 degrees,” and Jan. 15, 1970, about my dad: “Dick hears (S.D. Senator George) McGovern speak. Not impressed.”

On July 12, 1975, my little sister appears: “Nea gets new rabbits from Mollers.” That’s followed by Jan. 19, 1976: “Third batch of dead bunnies found in cage.”

For March 6, 1976, my little brother shows up, “Greg still trying to climb tree for Wolf Badge.”

The summer cabin arrives: July 5, 1971: “Nea spots deer ‘fingerfoots’ at cabin.” There’s Aug. 20, 1971: “Fish count at cabin: Greg-5, Dick-2.”

For my sister, Jennifer, there’s May 20, 1971: “Jen wins Star Award at West Junior High,” and July 24, 1976, a highlight of growing up in a state with low-point beer: “Jen 18, buys six-pack, hung over.”

There’s the political: Aug. 7, 1974: “President Nixon resigns.” There’s fashion: Aug. 8, 1975: “Jamie has pre-wedding haircut, comes unglued.”

There’s a smattering of psychology: Dec. 21, 1973: “Mom has bad case of ‘bah-humbugs.’ ” And religion: Dec. 28, 1970: “Greg wants tree down/tired of ‘Jesus bit.’ “

Surely my American family isn’t so different from everybody else’s. We’re a collection of diverse perspectives and strong opinions, gleeful souls and crabby moods, bound by fierce love and occasional flashes of annoyance.

Somewhere along the way, we acquired tolerance, and if we sometimes struggled with respect, we learned about forgiveness and grace, perseverance and love.

The four of us moved out into the world long ago to pursuits as far flung as studying art on a Greek island and attending graduate school at Columbia University. Now we’re scattered from the Atlantic to the Pacific. These days we’re discovering that America feels like a particularly unruly family, with its wiseacres and its clowns, the smart and the dim, the devout and the irreverent all clamoring for attention.

But I’m also coming to realize that all of those elements can simultaneously exist in any one family — and even in any one individual. So here’s my Christmas hope — that we in this country rediscover all we hold in common this holiday season — and on Dec. 25 I find a copy of the Tobias Family Calendar, version 2006, tucked under my tree with triumph and joy.