Christmas Holiday

        It’s the Christmas season...are you in the mood yet?  I would like to start off by saying Christmas is one of my least favorite holidays.  The meaning behind it has completely been lost somewhere behind presents and parties.  Kids couldn’t care less that they are celebrating the birth of Jesus.  What they do care about is what is under that tree that they are entitled to.  If you ask any child (including mine) what their favorite thing about Christmas is, do you think they are going to say: “Going to church for the candlelight service with all the Christian music”?  Or maybe, “Sitting around the house with family I haven’t seen in a year”.  Or even, “Taking gifts to the children’s shelter.”  No, we are raising our children to be excited about the gifts.  Let’s understand something...I am guilty of this.  The Chief and I start threatening taking Christmas presents away as early as July! As of right now, the only thing the Little Man is getting under the tree this year is his framed office referrals from the principal (office referrals: bad reports).  Merry Christmas Little Man...sucks to be you.  We are evil, I know.  Back onto why I don’t like this holiday. Note to self: get ADD medication for myself.

So not only have we completely lost the meaning of this special day, but we have crammed it with spending money.  So who benefits?  Every retail store imaginable.  This can be good, because it supplies jobs.  That would make Baby Jesus happy.  Presents.  I hate this part.  I love to give, but I hate the stress of giving when people feel like they have to return and give me something.  It takes the fun out of giving.  To me it isn’t fun to give when you get something back...then we are just trading money.  I mean can you even call that gift-giving?  I think it should be called gift-trading.  “Hey want to come over for Christmas dinner and some gift-trading?”  There isn’t anything that is fun about that to me.  If you want to buy me a gift, buy me one for my birthday.  Don’t buy me a present and call it, “Celebrating the birth of Jesus aka: Christmas”.  

Note to Chief: Please close this blog and move onto the next one.  P.S.- I better have gifts under the tree...I was good this year.

This will be my first Christmas away from my family.  This is a sad thing for me.  The last five years, my parents have spent the night with the Chief, Little Man, and I on Christmas Eve.  We then wake up, do the gift-trade, and have breakfast together.  It has been a tradition.  I have always had them close to me on this special day.  There is something I love about this holiday.  I love being with my family.  My family that includes my parents, my son, my husband, and my sister and her family.  This year, it will just be the three of us getting up together.  The house will be quiet.  It is time to set new traditions.  How we are going to set this day apart from any regular day, I am not yet sure.  It will just be the three of us.  To me, that isn’t very special since it is usually just the three of us.  I am trying to be optimistic...those of you that know me know that not only is the glass half empty but I am stressing about running out of the water and not being able to replace it.  This isn’t why I don’t like this holiday, but it does add to my pile of dislikes.  

When I was a kid, do you know what I remember about Christmas?  I remember that on Christmas Eve we would go as a family to the church.  We will pile in there like sardines, and we would each get a candle.  We would spend 30 minutes with our church family, singing and worshiping God.  We spent those thirty minutes reading from the bible.  We would read about how Mary and Joseph went for miles and miles looking for a place to stay.  A pregnant virgin, riding on the back of a donkey.  After they found a barn, not a room at the inn, but a barn...she climbed off the back of that donkey and gave birth to a miracle.  We sang songs...our shoulders were touching we were all so close.  It was so warm, and you could feel the love radiating off of our bodies.  Then we would go home.  We would get to open one present (usually new pajamas).  Then we went to bed.  In the morning, mom would come in and read us the same story she did every year on this day.  We would go to the tree, open our few presents that we were ALWAYS very grateful for, and we would have breakfast together...mom’s homemade cinnamon rolls.  Then we would go to the house of close-friends and we would have Christmas dinner.  It was special.  We didn’t get gifts from anyone else, because we didn’t have any family around.  And you know what?  It worked.  I am so thankful my parents raised me the way they did.  I am so thankful we weren’t raised to expect this and that, and everything on a four-page Christmas list.  We knew why we were celebrating, and it wasn’t about the gifts.  I have tried to repeat this cycle, and can say I have probably failed.  I can emphasize the true importance, but it doesn’t help when society makes it about gift-giving.  It is so hard to teach a child one thing, when they get something else outside your front door.   

So, like the rest of you, I will be doing the gift-trade with the Chief, and unlike the rest of you, we will be presenting our child with his framed office referrals.  Or maybe coal.  Or maybe frozen dog turds.  Or even better, a picture of Jesus...so he can be reminded of what this holiday is REALLY about.  

Can I hear an Amen?