What is Christmas to you? Could you live without the "LOOT" from Christmas?

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I admit it, I woke up in a deep funk this morning. Yesterday I loaned my best friend another $50. This time it was to give her "husband" who is into drugs again. We had suggested that he get his marijuana license so that he wouldn't be paying street prices for his pot. She kept $50 out of his money for the license, then the next day he demanded it back. She didn't tell him that she spent it, and she called me in tears. Stupid me gave it to her last night. I figured that I didn't want the possibility of her getting hit on my conscious. I am on a very limited budget and it had pretty much eliminated doing Christmas for me. Then I got to thinking, this lady stashed $100 so she can go to the dollar store and buy a hundred dollars worth of Christmas presents, so there is a lot of gifts under the tree. UHHH does anyone else see a flaw in this thinking? I got up thinking, how many of us go out and spend hundreds of dollars for gifts for people we love to make them happy on one day out of the year? The first Christmas no one ever thought of spending that kind of money...they didn't spend money on "Ipods", "Nintendos and games" and what ever other high ticket items that were on peoples gift lists. Even in later years after Christ was sacrificed for us, they didn't give horrendously expensive gifts that put them in debt for the rest of the year. It wasn't until recent years that we got busy and started getting horribly expensive gifts for each other. My question is: Would the people that you give gifts to love you any less if you didn't give them the latest and most expensive gifts on their lists? What about if there were a few less presents under the tree? Watching the television and the "new" items they are coming out with just in time for Christmas is appalling! You go and price the items and they average a hundred bucks apiece! It seems like Christmas isn't Christmas unless there are presents floor to ceiling. You have to give gifts to everyone you know or are friends with. It isn't always acceptable to give hand made gifts. It seems to me that there is something wrong with the picture. Or maybe it was loaning that fifty dollars that did it for me. It hasn't been a good year, and it is showing in my attitudes. My daughter, son in law, two grand daughters and the son in laws uncle stayed with me for nine months. Then last month I get a horrible e-mail from my daughter telling me what a horrible mother I am and that I should have aborted her or put her up for adoption. My best friend's husband, who she loved with every ounce of her being (trust me there are a lot of ounces in that being), admitted that he was cheating on her and wants a divorce; plus he went back on drugs after being clean for 15 years. Then, when my money is stretched to the max because I am paying off the bills from having my kids stay with me (and they ran up bills!!! They don't now nor ever will have the money to pay me back) and I end up giving my friend the fifty so her husband won't get pissed. The wonderful thing that happened last night was when I got home last night I found a 18 pound bag of cat food on my door step because my neighbors know how really strapped I am. I can't afford to put propane in the tank to heat my house and my water. I am using a wood burning stove to heat the place. Other things have happened that weren't good, but I don't want to depress people too much. Hence the following questions: What is Christmas to you? Could you live without the gifts that are the form of celebrating Christmas? Do you think that people would love you less if you cut back your Christmas gifts? Would they get upset if the gifts were hand made instead of store bought? Would you feel better if you got your credit card bill and it was thousands less to pay off next year?