On Christmas Eve, stores are always filled with last-minute shoppers searching frantically for the last few gifts on their Christmas shopping list. In some cases, it’s a last-ditch effort to find that one perfect gift. In others, let’s face it, perfect no longer factors into the equation.

Trust me, I know. Because every year, I’m one of them.

Sure, I start out with the best of intentions. This will be the year, I think, where I start early and have everything purchased, wrapped and under the tree at least a week in advance of the big day. But invariably, my plans are foiled and there is at least something which drives me to abandon the relative calm and security of work or home and brave the chaotic desperation inherent with the stores on Christmas Eve.

This year, I’m afraid, is no different. I was so proud of myself a couple of weeks ago. I had more than half of my shopping done by the first weekend of December. I thought that maybe, just maybe, this year would be the one when I could sit back and laugh at all those who waited until the last minute to finish their Christmas shopping.

But no. It just wasn’t meant to be.

Here I sit, with a slew of people left to buy for, surrounded by piles of un-mailed Christmas cards - which, for the record, I did actually write out. I just never got to the post office. Now I’m faced with a familiar dilemma. Do I send them now, even though I know there’s no way they’ll make it in time, or do I add them to the bunch I never mailed last December? A little White Out and I could be good to go for next year.

Procrastination has always been a factor in the past. Why do something today, when I could put it off until tomorrow or, even better, next week!

But, surprisingly enough, that wasn’t the case this year. I’ve just been too busy with work. In a good way.

I’m talking, of course, about our Delivering Christmas series, volunteering for which took up a number of my afternoons, nights and weekends. For once, I’m not complaining about the extra hours I put in. Because as a result of this series, and the work went into it, this Christmas has been very special for me. Spending all that time helping others and being with people so dedicated to helping those in need has reminded me what the holiday season should be all about.

It’s about giving, not gaily wrapped presents, but of our ourselves.