Holidays Make No Cents

My wife decided to put up a Christmas tree this year. And for the record, I’m opposed to Christmas trees. I don’t understand the point of cutting down a live tree that wasn’t bothering anyone… Unless you count allergies or providing lots of oxygen for creatures like you and me to breathe… Just to drag it into your home to gaudy it up for everyone to “enjoy”. I have never understood that.

At least the wife purchased a fake tree that will serve her for years to come. The last one needed to be retired to the landfill.

And that brings me to seasonal or holiday decorations. I’m having trouble understanding it. Why do some people feel it necessary to decorate the house for seasons or holidays?

Valentine’s Day is light on the list. There’s not a whole lot going on with that holiday. Easter is also on the lighter side when it came to decorations, but it meant new church clothes for me and my sisters. St. Patrick’s Day is also on the light side. I mean most people can get away with just turning their beers green and wearing green. The Fourth of July gets a pass only because being patriotic can be a year-round kind of thing. There’s no time limit on being patriotic. Halloween isn’t my thing, but I know A LOT of people that love it. They can go a little crazy with the decorations and costumes. The costumes I support especially the slutty female costumes. Thanksgiving involves not only turkeys and pilgrims, but all things that represent the fall season. And then there’s the granddaddy of them all… Christmas. Some people go ALL OUT for Christmas.

People spend a large sum of money to decorate for holidays. And usually the decorations get dragged out of some attic, garage, or a closet for about 30 days of year. What is going on with the other 335 days?

That’s right! People spend all that money on decorations to store them away for most of the time they possess those decorations. It just doesn’t make sense to me. I’ve never understood it. Especially those folks that like to light up their house like an ELO concert. Those lights have to be stored somewhere and those in that particular spirit get the added benefit of a larger power bill. But LED lights are getting around to take care of that aspect.

Maybe I’m a little bit of a grinchy mofo. I’ve been called worse. But I feel that I'm just being practical. Purchasing holiday decorations seems like a colossal waste of money to me. But hey, if you want to waste your money and storage space just like my wife then by all means, knock yourself out. It’s your money. It’s your space.

Gorillaz 'Gorillaz'

If you personally know me, then it’s no surprise that I dislike the Christmas season.

It’s not because I have a problem with greed, gluttony, consumerism, children, Santa Claus, Hanukkah, new electronics, Christianity, or even Kwanza. I live and let live.

My dislike of the Christmas season came at an early age.

Oh sure, it was great getting up at an ungodly hour to see what the jolly old elf snuck into the house during the night as well as ripping through other gifts. That was awesome. What turned me against the holiday was being forced to participate in almost every church Christmas play.

My mother was typically involved as the director or assistant director or the music director, so she had me and my sisters involved. I never wanted to be included. Wearing itchy costumes and memorizing painfully bad dialogue wasn’t my idea of a “good time”. It seemed endless and I found it painful practicing the plays every week. And practices usually cranked up in the beginning of November.

I despised it. My sisters never seemed to care. If they did, I was busy with my mind “checked out” to notice.

Now I’m not trying to be sacrilegious… Seriously, how many times do we need the birth of Christ shoved down our throats?

No room. Check. Manger. Check. Large star. Check. Three wise men. Check. Animals. Check. Angel appears. Check. Christ is born. Yeah, we know. We’ve heard it all about for two thousand years.

Occasionally, there would be new plays with the same kind of messages along with new and different songs. But it still sucked major ass to be involved with them. I just soldiered through and kept my bitching at a minimum.

When I turned 18 I wasn’t required to participate or even go to church. So I took full advantage of that freedom and haven’t looked back. But I still cringe when my mother tries the guilt-trip routine with “all I want for Christmas is for you to come to our church Christmas program”.

I’ve given in to it a few times. I’m not a completely heartless bastard.

I worked in retail for over a decade of my life and that also added to my dislike of the Holiday season. Traffic gets worse. I’ve seen fistfights over parking spaces. People are less polite. It was hellish and I truly appreciate the folks that work in retail during this time of year. I go out of my way to be polite, personable, and pleasant to all the “associates” throughout the stores when I’m there. I try to do the majority of my purchases online so I don’t have to deal with the rest of humanity. I have the distinct impression that they’ll tap dance all over Stephen Hawking with golf spikes to get the hottest sale item for Christmas. And my mood becomes that of a rabid dog when I’m in long lines filled with the last-minute undecided and restless, sticky-handed children.

I don’t care for decorating the house for any holiday either. It seems unwise spending money on things that sit 10 months or more in storage. So if Chigger wants to decorate for the holidays, she can knock herself out. I’ll be doing something else with a beer in my hand. I’ll help with some heavy lifting, but I draw the line at distributing and tacking up holiday eye candy.

Holiday movies?

Not a fan of those either. They’re usually a musical or filled with heartwarming crap. ‘Die Hard’ is great and I absolutely love ‘The Waltons: The Homecoming’. It’s hilariously bad.

I’ve never seen the majority of the “holiday favorites”. And that includes the television specials like ‘Grinch’, ‘Rudolph’, ‘Frosty’, and ‘Peanuts’. I have absolutely no desire and never had it.

Chigger asked me a couple of years ago to watch ‘A Christmas Story’ with her during a week long marathon. It became so painful for her that she eventually threw the remote control, said a few curse words, and declared me to be an unstable human being.

Sorry… You hear about the movie in great detail EVERY SINGLE YEAR by your friends that love it, it kinda loses all its luster.

And for some reason, I got ‘A Christmas Story’ t-shirt from my niece Gracie this year. Either she or her mother is under the impression that I have held Gracie while watching that “holiday classic”. Someone is under the belief that it’s one of my favorites. Manufactured or not, I can live with the gift of a starfish shaped kid wrapped in a coat with an “amusing” phrase on a red shirt. I don’t want to seem ungrateful nor do I want to hurt anyone’s feelings. I just can’t understand how someone I grew up with could overlook my lifelong dislike of holidays. Oh well.

I wish folks a “Merry Christmas” with a smile. I don’t DARE wish someone I know that’s a Christian a “Happy Holiday”. They’ve got a real chip on their shoulder about that one. They get agitated and pontificate on “the reason for the season” along with a healthy dose of a conspiracy to take Christ out of Christmas by the flaming liberals.

If it didn’t take so long to calm them down, I would probably find it more amusing. I have never had the riot act read to me by a Jewish person if I give them a “Happy Holiday” or a “Merry Christmas”. But it’s been my observation that Baptists do like their drama.

In closing, I hope everyone reading this had a wonderful holiday season. Now lets get this New Year’s thing over with and give it all a rest for 10 months.