Conflicted about Christmas
So why am I talking about Christmas before Halloween when I hate that? Because we moved over the summer and I'm seeing a different side to this new neighborhood. It seemed like a nice, normal, stereotypically suburban neighborhood when we got here which goes to show you should never move to a neighborhood without first checking it out in Holiday season.
Within two square blocks we have a dozen or so excessively decorated houses for Halloween. I don't mean a couple of window decals...I mean full on lights, yard scenes, and enough inflatables to rivals Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade. I can only image we'll be visible from the naked eye from the space station in December.
So I kicked off my annual 'let's skip the whole Christmas thing this year' a little early. My proposition is always: no decorating, no trees, no holiday movies...I will do one weekend of baking (no sense punishing anyone by denying them homemade kolachkis, cranberry bread, etc. I'm not completely without a soul.)
The thing is ...I'm torn. I blame my parents. They were, in most ways, polar opposites. My mom was perpetually cheerful, optimistic, sunny, extroverted, and genuinely, inherently kind to everyone family or stranger alike because she truly saw the best in everyone (even when it didn't exist). My dad was....none of those things. He had many fine qualities - just not those.
Their differences were particularly striking when it came to the holidays. My mom was all about the personal attention and extrodinary effort to pick out just the right gift which shows how well you know someone. My dad's philosophy was that thoughtfulness was for people who didn't have money. Why knock yourself out trying to figure out what people want when they already know what they want so you can just give them cash? And if they want gifts to open fine...they can make a list complete with stores, item #s, etc. Less Santa and more like ordering from a catalog.
With dad's way you were never surprised or emotionally moved, but you also didn't get the sometimes epic fails when Mom got it wrong. Was nice to have a mix. They divorced when I was very young so the dichotomy of their decorating styles affected me as well.
Dad's idea of decorating for Christmas:
There. Happy now?
Where Mom would have thought these people were off to a good start...
And if she had thought of it, I absolutely would have been picked up from school in a station wagon version of this...
In most ways I am my father's daughter. I am not a fan of people, fuss, exuberance makes me emotionally itchy. And I want to opt out of the Christmas stuff because I do the lions share of the work and I'm never rewarded with those Normal Rockwell moments. My kids bicker when helping set up the trees, complain about my baking their siblings favorite cookies before theirs, mercilessly mock my holiday penguin collection, and even though all young adults still can't manage to buy for each other or their father without involving me (unfortunately we don't have enough money to make my dad's solution workable so we have to do the effort thing.)
And asking for the three of them to get together for one nice photo...you'd think I was suggesting taking out their organs with Bactine and a butter knife to sell on the black market. But the second I suggest not decorating?
But I'm going to try to stick to it this year. Not caving to those faces - they know where the Christmas things are and can have at it if they like... but except for two days of baking I'm opting out. No cheer, no desktop wallpaper of pets in holiday outfits,no buying every penguin item I see, no shopping and all the extra free time I save will be my gift to me.
this will not be my wallpaper...
nor this...
This...
this..
this...
or this...
none of that cuteness. I mean it this year, I'm sitting this out.
- 3
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