Christmas is such a weird time of year. Deny it, I dare you. No matter how you wrap it in shiny paper, and surround it with hypnotic lights, the stinky fish smell of the season still seeps through the happy snowmen.
“Herring again, Aunt Jenny?”
“You’re a growing boy, Robby…”
Don’t get me wrong. I love Christmas. As a Christian, I celebrate the birth of our savior, whom scholars have decreed, actually popped into the first nativity scene sometime around mid August, much to the surprise of the little soapstone Mary.
As a man/boy-boy/man I await the future coming of the chubby sky sledder jerking the chain of eight harnessed load beasts, one red nosed commercial, and a keen disciplinarian sense of harsh toy deprivation policies for the disobedient. I’ve either failed to meet his expectations every year or he doesn’t exist. That answer lies somewhere between the chimneystack of false hope and closed flue of self-image.
“hmmm, something rotten in the state of gifting and it’s not Aunt Jenny’s fish…”
As a human Rob, I await the promised blessing of peace on earth and good will towards man, and as soon as the last SUV is obliterated from the California freewayscape, I just might get it.
Maybe.
See, that’s the problem with Christmas. A writer would never write about a real Christmas. Real Christmases are too anti-climactic. There’s all this build up, with everybody trying so hard to make the day more than number 359 out of 365 in an endless series of day after day repetition.
Anticipatory build-up leads to the morning, when a five-minute Tasmanian flurry of wrapping shreds leads to a molehill of gifts and mountain discards. The end.
“That’s it?”
Yup, exactly like the first time you had sex. Except with sex, it got better. If not, you just need more practice. Ask Santa. Leave him your cookie, and he’ll bring the sex next year.
Like I said, I’m not the Christmas poo-pooer; I leave that to South Park. I love Christmas, and I have the hope that each one will get better, but ever since I was a kid, they haven’t. The day turns as lackluster as day 365, 163, and 260. After the present is opened, the surprise is past, and I’m left with the feeling of, “what’s next?”
Yeah, go ahead, say it: it’s like a divorce a year. Sigh, thanks.
I don’t think it’s the gifts, I mean I get what I want, or at least have any right to expect. MyEx never did give me the little Hooters girl I asked for. Does that count? I mean I could see her reasoning; have you ever tried wrapping one of those?
So Christmas is over, and now I’m evaluating a battlefield of tissue paper carnage. I got what I wanted, or at least what I had any right to expect. So what’s the big shrug? It’s not the company, I had a good time, but this could have been day 43 and would I have enjoyed it anymore?
I guess on one hand I’m not as materialistic as I’d like to be—on that I should be grateful. On the other hand I’m lacking something I should be—on that I’m concerned. I’d love to tell you that it’s somebody or something else, but my eggnog is half empty no matter how rum full you pour the glass.
MyEx would say I’m too critical. I can’t argue; when it comes to myself, I am. I’ve got a Santa’s sleigh of expectations, and every year I fall short. I want to tell you that going into the New Year I won’t, but I will.
All the same, it’s one of the best gifts. See, every year I drive myself, to be my best. I’ll never live up to my expectation, but if I don’t try or at least push myself, I’ll end up stale like last years fruitcake.
Still, I need a way to detach it from the doorway mistletoe; I need to kiss the lackluster from the holiday. I need to sweep the chimney clear of past year’s Santas. Maybe that’s my gift this year. Maybe I can blame the shortcomings on MyEx. Her taking blame for all my previous shortcomings, that would be the best gift ever.
Yeah, I know, I’ll hold my breath for the Hooter’s girl instead.
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