The holiday season didn’t just sneak up on me this year. It bent me over. Hard. Without warning or lubrication. I don’t mean that in a dirty, slutty, holy shit, Amy can you stop reading erotica way. I mean it in the, one day I saw a post on Facebook that said “Only 10 Saturdays until Christmas” and I was all, “Screw that” and went about my life.
Probably should have marked that on the calendar.
All of a sudden Amazon Prime is telling me my order won’t arrive until January 6th. Bah! Humbug!
And the children are asking for ridiculous gifts that aren’t cheap or even safe. Bah! Humbug!
Then the baby discovered a mesh bag of chocolate coins and ate them, through the mesh and the gold paper. Bah! Humbug!
Celebrating both Hannukah and Christmas is like a month of gift giving followed by a morning of shock and awe that George W. Bush would be proud of. Bah! Humbug!
And someone stole my credit card number and bought hundreds of dollars worth of shit with my money, that I didn’t authorize and will never have the pleasure of using, or breaking. Bah! Humbug!
So, even though I shouldn’t be surprised or unprepared, every year, like clockwork, I find myself knee deep in the holidays, my inner voice yelling, “Aw, fuck this” at every turn.
And I need to stop that shit. Right now.
It’s certainly easy to let the holiday season mess with your head. The 45 day period leading up to New Years takes my normally hectic schedule up to a double dose of Viagra situation. Eventually, something breaks – or ends up in an ER, needing to be drained – and letting it get that far is all on me.
This year, I’m taking the holidays back.
This year, my holiday won’t be a humbug and I will not let it be bah’ed.
Because the word humbug in itself implies that the person expressing it believes that the holiday season is a fake, fraud, or something that doesn’t exist. And to the Ebenezer Scrouges of the world, this marathon of gifts and parties, cooking and scheduling chaos is a humbug. Everyone refers to the magic of the holiday season, especially with kids, but magic doesn’t just make itself. It’s a personal choice if you decide to make it magical.
If you don’t believe in the magic of the holiday season, you have no reason to celebrate. And to me, the holidays are just an amazing excuse to do just that. Getting together for great food and drinks, surrounded by a table of people I love as they laugh and smile is what the holidays are all about. Watching little faces light up on Christmas morning or on a Hanukkah night after receiving a gift is something I am incredibly thankful for. Most days so many things on the agenda seem to be things we “have to” do and this year, I want to turn all those feelings into “want to”.
At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter who we pray to, what we worship, or how we rejoice. What matters the most is the memories I’m making with my children. The smells of frying latkes that waft from our house for the 8 nights of Hanukkah, because I fry them for everyone we know. The feel of sugar cookies under the weight of the rolling pin as we complete our 10th dozen for gifts. Their eyes as they watch Daddy dance with me in the kitchen (and goose me a bit) while we are watching White Christmas – and he thinks no one is looking.
No matter what life is throwing at me now, my holiday season won’t be Bah Humbuged! Because I believe that if I make this time special, it will be special and the only person who can take that feeling away from me, is me. And Mamma don’t play like that.
Bah Humbug?
Nope.
Not even a little bit.