FOR CHRISTMAS my mother always gave my father things she thought he needed, or better yet, things she wanted, or wanted him to have. Hence an endless parade through the years of spruce-colored sport coats he never wore, floor mats for the car, an oversized copper teapot, and how-to books on leading an “abundant” life.

He was lukewarm about the shredder at first. He said he didn't need it, hadn't asked for it, likened it to receiving a xerox machine as a gift. But when he saw my mother's face fall he perked up his voice and said, "Office machinery. How very unpredictable."

As he turned the box in his lap, skimming the descriptions of the shredder's myriad features, I saw the gleam in his eye begin to warm. And I am an astute enough observer of human expression to recognize this gleam as the outward manifestation of true joy in his heart.

It's funny, the things that bring to light that joy. My father snapped the cutting contraption onto the gray plastic trash can like a helmet and cleared away a patch of floor for his little soldier. It was snowing outside, but hardly sticking.

"Give me something," he said to no one in particular.

My brother handed him a torn piece of wrapping paper.

He dangled the paper above the shredder's jaw, touching the slit with the paper's edge and quickly pulling it away.

"Quit teasing it," my mother said.

My father, well into his third hard apple cider of the evening, chuckled, stood up and made a grand, sweeping gesture with his arms as if he were on stage. "Ladies and gentlemen," he began, "witness, one and all, the final demise of Peter P. Paper, known obscurer of presents, accomplice to one Santa (pause) Clause, who began his life at—" He turned to my mother.

"Walgreens," she said.

"Who began his short life at Walgreens and will end it here, high in these mountains on a snow-dusted, moonless night—"

"Jesus Christ," my brother moaned.

Slowly, resolutely, my father lowered the paper into the shredder as we all watched. Nothing happened. He pushed it with some force into the slit and still, nothing.

My aunt, who spent most of every Christmas in the kitchen, announced that a new batch of cider was ready.

Then, "You have to plug it in." This from my teenage cousin who was reading Us Weekly on the couch.

"Of course we do," my father said, sloshing some of his cider onto the floor in his rush to get back to the living room. "From what corners of the earth do you derive your genius, sage one?"

My cousin rolled her eyes and went back to her magazine.

"She doesn't think you're funny," my mother said, kissing the top of my father's head on her way back from the kitchen, "but I do."

My father was too busy crawling around on the floor to notice her, scraping away seas of wrapping paper and boxes in search of an outlet.

Once connected, the shredder hummed to life.

"It's alive!" my uncle shouted in his best mad scientist voice. He and my father clinked cups and downed the rest of their cider. My aunt was like a specter, emerging from the kitchen just long enough to refill their cups, and then disappearing again.

It was snowing harder now, wet chunky flakes clinging to the trees. I watched it falling and felt that familiar itch to get out there. It was dark enough now. The trees would be black swags against the sky and in an hour or so, if the snow kept up, it would have muzzled every sound in the forest. There is something comforting about that phenomenon—a quiet, gradual silencing.

Now, with some prospect of excitement in the room, my cousin popped up from the couch, suddenly interested in what the rest of us were doing. She offered her bookmark as the shredder's first victim.

"But what about Mr. Paper?" my mother whined. I could tell she was tipsy because she used her little girl voice and pulled at her legs in an attempt to fold them beneath her at some impossible angle.

My father declared that we would offer not one, but two items in our first sacrifice to the shredder. With that, my cousin's unicorn bookmark and the wrapping paper with the candy cane pattern disappeared.

I think we were all a little surprised by the sound that accompanied their departure. It was loud, much louder than you would ever think, and grinding, and the papers quivered like reeds as they slipped away. There was a crunching sound and the noise of the blades, which you could tell were very sharp.

When it was over no one said a thing. No one wanted to be the first to dig into the trash can and produce the fruits of our destruction. My father finally took the plunge and handed my cousin what was left of her bookmark. She held the confetti strips in her palm, picking through them gingerly with a puzzled look on her face. Back on the couch, she pulled a rubber band off her wrist and did her best to bind the strips together in a bouquet, which she then jammed back between the pages of her magazine.

When it's snowing hard enough, pieces of the landscape begin to disappear. First, the lights of the town in the distance. Gone. Dark, pointy treetops that tiptoe down the mountain. Gone. The world erased piece by piece, right before your eyes.

My cousin's courage unleashed a tide of cautious curiosity. We emptied pockets and wallets, dismantled a stack of newspapers lying on the coffee table. We shredded receipts, old grocery lists, expired coupons and half-finished to-do lists. My uncle gave up his buy-ten-get-your-next-one-free burrito card and vowed to start a diet. My aunt threw in a recipe for corned beef hash that always came out a little tough. My mother shredded a worn clipping of a hairstyle she'd once admired. My brother produced a membership card for the gym his ex-girlfriend made him join. The card looked so small in the wide mouth of the shredder.

"It's a cleansing," my father said as he piled logs onto the fire. "A group renewal! Shed that which drags you down!" Then he offered up a love note from my mother that he'd been carrying around for 15 years. She recognized her handwriting and said, "Wait!" But it was too late. The faded blue stationery trembled violently on its way down.

My mother frowned and scratched her forehead, pawing through her purse until she surfaced a ragged photo of my father as a boy on his bicycle.

"Out with the old!" she said, tossing it into the slot.

My father watched the picture in dumb silence. I got rid of a phone number to distract them. It was for an old childhood friend I'd run into at the grocery store, someone, I realized as I watched the number disappear, whom I might never see again.

The shredder hummed along through it all—always willing, always ready. My brother shredded a Joe Montana trading card I'd given him, and I returned the favor with a free movie pass I knew he would have used.

By the time we finished, the snowfall had slowed to a flurry. I knew those pieces of landscape I remembered—the town, the trees, the road in the distance—were now gone. We trundled off to bed one by one, leaving the shredder in the middle of the mess on the floor. My cousin was the only one with enough good sense to unplug it.


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