Toni and Bob Besser make a “huge deal” of Christmas.

“We’re big on tradition,” Mrs. Besser said, noting that selecting a live tree and baking cookies are all part of the annual festivities with their three boys, ages 9, 6 and 4.

“I want that to be something they’d remember,” she said of Christmas.

But, two members of the house have had a hard time exhibiting much Christmas spirit this year: the parents.

The Bessers are drowning in debt, they fear they could lose their house – although their bank has not foreclosed, the couple filed for bankruptcy as a preemptive measure – and they can’t catch a break. Many of the decisions they have made that they hoped would provide for a better future have backfired.

“Thank God for these kids,” Mrs. Besser said. “Without them, I might have given up on everything.”

The Bessers have bought no Christmas gifts for their boys, but were able to get them some presents through Sharpsville schools. Besser used the $50 he was going to spend on a Christmas gift for his wife on a veterinarian bill.

The Bessers don’t think they are different from many other people in the area facing hard times in a down economy, and know there are some who are worse off than them. Mrs. Besser said she donated food to a food drive and a single mother with children for that reason.

But, the mood is far from festive as they sit around their kitchen table and tell their story.

“It’s just depressing,” Besser said. “Everything around here is depressing.”

The mood worsens when Besser, a self-proclaimed “newshound,” flicks on Fox News or CNN and learns the latest about government bailouts, executives in private jets, and money going to banks that use it to buy other banks instead of helping people having trouble paying their mortgages.

The Bessers have been married for 10 years and live in the house Besser grew up in, on two acres in the eastern part of Clark, with corn fields for neighbors. There’s lots of open space for three growing boys to run around, and the Bessers hope some day to be able to turn over the property to one of their sons.

Up until recently, both worked, he as a mill worker and she as a phlebotomist. Now, only Mrs. Besser is employed.

Besser was hired in 1994, but the mill work became “inconsistent” with a change of owners. He was laid off much more frequently and shifted from shop to shop, sometimes doing “back-breaking” work that was more physically strenuous than he liked, he said.

During a layoff this summer, Besser got a job at another mill.