What Is Wrong With Christmas?

All my life, I have loved Christmas. The colors. The activities and the swirling crowds. The stories. The parties. The generous spirit which, alas, disappears by December 28 every year. The music. Ah, the music. What can I say? I’m in heaven at Christmas time with all the wonderful music that comes out. I enjoy most of the traditional songs, and I positively drool over the seasonal classical music you can find on NPR or PBS, or at local concerts.

Although my beliefs have been transformed so that they no longer embrace many standard Christian teachings, I have continued to love Christmas. Probably for the more “pagan” aspects of the season, for the Bible stories become stranger to me each year. (None of that affects my love of the music.)

Musicians are usually very busy at Christmas and Easter, including me this year, for with a week’s notice I was resurrecting a piano piece and my half of a duet to help my sister out She had been asked, at the last minute, to provide ten minutes of preludes before her church’s Christmas Eve service.

So on top of everything else I do at Christmas, I was seriously practicing.

It really crowded everything else I generally do: cards by snail mail, cards over the internet, shopping, wrapping, baking (not a lot, usually, but some), putting up and decorating my small tree. In fact, there was no baking. I barely got the punch made that I consume during the season, especially when putting up and taking down the tree.

And this year, doggone it, I didn’t really enjoy any of it. I enjoyed Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. That was it.

What really gets me is that everyone else feels the same way I do. When was the last time I heard someone say they were sorry that Christmas was over? Why? What makes us rush around cramming all that activity into a few weeks when we don’t enjoy it? Is there a way I can streamline this, so that Christmas can be enjoyable again?

One thing I might do is start earlier. Which means, before Thanksgiving. I refuse to do that. Thanksgiving is too meaningful for me, and I will not let it get buried in yuletide busy-ness. There has to be another way.

One thing I might do to ease Christmas stress is send cards only to people that I don’t keep in touch with throughout the year. And send as many e-cards, and as few snail-cards, as possible. Local telephone calls would also help to cut the “card load”.

The thing that would really reduce the time and pressure for me is…cutting out that shopping. I can bake presents for local friends, as needed. As for the family, my young great-nephew and I may try to push for a change in the way the family does gifts. That might give us all something new to think about during the season, while easing some of the pressures for all of us. Of course, that all depends on the willingness of the family to go along. Except for my great-nephew who is college now, we have enough stuff anyway.

I will have to think about it this coming year. I love Christmas too much to tolerate being unable to enjoy it. For me, the stories will make a little less sense next year than they did this year. There’s nothing I can do about that. I can’t go backwards, which would undo the marvelous moment that turned me into this Creator-besotted person. But I can work to ease the stresses and re-open myself to the joys of the season.

Christmas is supposed to be a celebration, after all. So let’s enjoy it!