What’s December’s problem?
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It introduces itself and then just disappears like a Tinder date who ghosts you when they realise they’re still hung up on their ex like a Christmas stocking on a mantelpiece.
Then it comes back again the next year, ‘ready’ to try again, and does the same damn thing.
I remember being strict about leaving it until December 1 to put up the tree, hang any lights, wrap any presents, write any cards.
I’d run out of time if I was still loyal to that tradition these days.
I’d probably chuck some tinsel on one of the existing plants in the house and call it a tree.
I wouldn’t even go to the effort of hanging lights at all (just quietly, I didn’t this year anyway).
Everyone would get their presents in Coles-branded paper bags.
And no-one would get a card.
It’s an illusion to think you’ve got a month.
Sure, we generally leave the tree up until New Year’s Day, but for the rest of it, you’ve got little more than three weeks to smash it out of the park.
Chuck in Christmas parties, catch-ups, gift deliveries, baking, end-of-year break-ups and work deadlines to meet before a shutdown, no matter how brief, and you’re more dribbling it feebly to the boundary line than smashing it beyond there.
Christmas is supposed to be a time to relax and enjoy quality time with the special people in your life.
But that generally doesn’t happen until the day of December 25.
And even then, not for whoever is hosting (thanks Mum, you’re the best).
The lead-up is just… So. Much. Pressure.
On top of stretching your already overflowing mind for perfect gift ideas, finding the time to shop for them and money to pay for the swollen December expenses, you’ve also got to find motivation to wrap them.
That’s a lot in three weeks if you hadn’t found time or funds earlier in the year.
A meme posed the question: “Christmas is the most wonderful time of year. For who, Amazon?”
It is crazy when you consider its origins and then look at the commercialised fanfare it has become.
It’s a lot.
It reminds me of the story that Valentine’s Day only exists because Hallmark made it a thing after marketeers brainstormed ways to make more money.
While there’s some truth to the ‘mother of the American Valentine’, Esther Howland, mass producing lace cards for the occasion, other sources suggest its origins do actually stretch back to pagan roots before it was Christianised with a saint’s influence and became a celebration of romantic love in the fifth century.
Somewhere along the line, us idiot humans felt like we needed to add more financial stress in our calendar cycle by purchasing flowers and jewellery and chocolate and dining in fancy restaurants or weekending at fancy resorts.
Anyway, back to Christmas.
If I dig deep, I can find the joy of the socialising, the winding down closer to Christmas and — with less excavation — definitely Christmas Day itself.
For all the money spent, I’m not cynical enough to roll my eyes as I watch gifts get unwrapped and calculate the dollars strewn on my lounge room floor.
I absolutely love seeing the excitement on the kids’ faces.
And just like that, nothing that came before it bothers me anymore.
So, you know, I’m not a complete Grinch.
But, I just can’t dig deep enough to find the excitement in decorating anymore.
I let the kids do it — well two out of three of them — entirely, and somewhat reluctantly, this year while I sat and watched them.
The youngest must have shared my non-existent enthusiasm.
As soon as I suggested they decorate the tree, he announced he had better things to do.
And then went to bed.
I laughed. Why do we bother? I thought.
Maybe next year we’ll just bring in the outdoor pallet Christmas tree I made a few years back.
Brush the cobwebs off it, sit it in the corner, turn on the lights and Bob’s your uncle. Sorted.
I can’t remember how I felt about decorating the tree when I was 16 or 18, but I fear my cynicism at my current age has poisoned my teenagers, who queued nothing but satirical Christmas songs to the lounge room speaker.
It perhaps shouldn’t have felt right, but it did.
Maybe this is our family’s sarcastic brand of Christmas.
Maybe all that matters is we are alive and well and together and laughing.
In fact, I know without even questioning it that those things really are all that truly matter.
So, whatever your family’s brand of Christmas is, no matter how traditional or modern or magically messed up it is, from my family to yours, we wish you a happy one.
See you on the other side of packdown.