It Is NOT TOO Early to Prepare… The Holidaze Are Coming!!!!

23rd October, 2009 - Posted by L. John Mason -

The days are getting shorter in the Northern Hemisphere and I realize that this can mean only one thing…. The Mid-Winter Holidaze are about to strike us once again!

EEEE GADDDS!

Though I freely admit that Thanksgiving Day and St. Patrick’s Day are my 2 favorite religious holidays because I like the food, I struggle with many of the other holidays and celebrations that I encounter. Expectations are so high, and usually unachievable. In the middle of Winter, my genetic programming wants me to “lay low” and conserve my resources, but the very opposite is demanded. In the wet, cool (or cold), dark months, my primitive coding asks that I find warm shelter and semi-hibernate. However, the people around me begin to swirl, like whirling dervishes, and prepare for huge unrealistic social activities and celebrations. The family that I have successfully avoided most of the year will gather under one roof for long, food filled hours of bantering about long forgotten shared memories in hopes of finding new memories for future celebratory events. I ask myself, “Where will I be able to hide from this onslaught?” Since drinking alcohol is not a healthy survival option, what will I be forced to endure???

I will be asked to do my part. I will help to clean the house. I will drive to the airport to collect familial celebrants. I will keep the home fires burning, quite literally. And, I will wash many dishes and glasses and pots and pans and serving platters and baking equipment… Consider my “dish-panned hands…”

The cameras will come out like surveillance devices on our country’s Southern borders. Special bake goods will find their ways to platters that will be draped on every flat surface of the house tempting me eat more sugar laden treats with every step I take through the mine-field of family fun. A tree will be dragged into my home (why I will never understand) to be decorated as a large cat toy with shiny dangling ornaments that are illuminated by waves of tinkling little energy robbing lights. Everyone will fake joy and love as they secretly wonder what they are getting in the unopened presents that will create disappointment and debt in coming days…

But, on the other hand…. This forced time of celebration is really good for business. Depression and anxiety and stress go way up…. It makes me jolly just to consider the long term, and often unresolved pain, that these holidaze create… HoHoHo Merry Holidaze…

This cynical view of the annual holiday celebrations is to be used for entertainment and for creating awareness. Many of us have seen the extremes like the Griswold Family Christmas and we know better than to take celebratory expectations to this level. Please consider your own emotional health and remember to invest in going out of your way to take GOOD care of yourself. If nothing else touches your soul, at least, minimize your extremes of expectations and be joyful in the moments you spend with pleasant thoughts, memories, and social interactions.