And So It Begins
My mother, being the old fashion value type, started the onslaught. Based on her upbringing and location, that being in a middle sized Midwest town, it came as no surprise to me that she slung out the first snowball of the holiday season. The twist of this being that because of our current locale, that being the southwest, honest to goodness slush balls are something that are in short supply if not an extinct species all together. This does nothing to deter my mother and on All Saints Day, my inbox was splattered with a �virtual� snow ball and I was informed that I only had 55 shopping days until Christ-mas.
Son of a bitch.
Mom loves the holidays, pulling out the decorations, multiple sized fake trees to decorate, themed dinnerware; the whole nine yards. Per our embedded southwest tradition, the parental units hold near and dear, the tree is put up and decorated on Thanksgiving, breads and fruitcakes are made a week prior and cookies are made the weekend of along with cheese balls, and other traditional(?), German cuisine leading up to the actual Xmas. Church is attended on Christ-mas eve and presents are opened promptly afterwards. The only change to this process has been the Xmas eve and day regiment. My sister and I haven�t attended church in close to a decade and will be giving into mom�s wishes this year and the Xmas eve presents and drinking of Rum came about because of my knack to get stuck with an early AM shift on Xmas day; the Rum is just a perk of being recognized as a full fledged grown up. Beyond these details, we are pretty much left to our own accord. Long abandon are car trips to view brightly lit house born Christmas displays in far off neighborhoods, caroling with neighbors or church groups and trips to purchase tinder dry REALL xmas trees. These and many other traditional sightings have been buried beneath the highways and byways of suburban america.
If it weren�t for the small family clan present in my suburban paradise, everyone I know would hate me this time of year; sometimes such a race is too close to call. I am the Bah-FUCKING-humbug king, Scrooge ain�t got shit on me and if you think the Grinch had a small shriveled heart and disdain for all the Who�s, then you haven�t seen my coal black soul come December 25. You see, dear reader, somewhere along the way Amerikans have forgotten the rhyme and reason for this holiday time and it has become buried in an avalanche of religious rhetoric and corporate flash. Last Xmas day evening I spent in a bar with a number of friends who gleefully cursed along with me and the year prior to that I was drunk in Denny�s when Santa was out delivering presents and even Catholics were retired to their beds after their dash to midnight mass-ness.
Regardless of what side you weigh in on, you normally are going to carry a heavy hand for either side. Lots of well to do, east and west coasters tend to flock to establishments that hawk wares and offer up glitz and glam, tricking most of those involved into buying things like electric back scratchers for Dear Aunt Frieda (a Paraplegic) or thickly scented perfumes for wee cousin Kate (whom is three) and even con us into thinking that sexist Uncle Frank would actually wear an Apron regardless of that fact it sports a naked woman on it or not. And we even fight over the right to give such gifts to people we know well enough to eat with once or twice a year, but have no idea what sort of tastes they have that don�t involved the seasoning they use in stuffing, alcoholic beverages of choice or if the TV in their house is in need of upgrading or not. Somehow the fact that the original idea behind this holiday some hundreds of years ago was to celebrate the birth of a guy in a book that has something to do with church has managed to slip everyone�s mind in a chaotic orgy of cannibalistic consumerism, where we are not beyond eating our own if it nets us the last Tickle Me Elmo (or whatever this years �HOT� toy is) on the shelf. This is the only time of year, a pair of 90 year old grandmothers will come to fisticuffs in a toy store.
The Christian sect, while a little bit closer to the true meaning of the holiday season, somehow still manages to miss the boat. While this part of the amerikan populace does things like donate time at food banks to dish out turkey dinners to the homeless, buy �tree� angels to help needy kids and donate time to various other feel good charities. But where is this feeling of giving, these selfless acts of sacrifice come June? Most of these same folks are too busy planning summer camps, booking Christian themed rock bands and church picnics to lift a finger any other time of year. The alienation of other religions also boggles my senses. During at time that is supposed to be about love and caring, we have a nation wide celebration that mocks and excludes others based on their religious preferences. Happy Hanukah and a wonderful Quanza to you all? Well sure, but not if you live in Amerika pal! The final straw in the mockery of this holiday time has got to be the birth of Christ plays. Thankfully for the son of the god whose birth everyone is celebrating, he was whisked away to a higher calling or I�m sure he would be rolling in his grave so hard, Bethlehem would be buried under an avalanche of�well�god like proportions. It is bad enough the reenactments are usually done poorly so, with shoddy props, acting and general inferior planning all around, but everyone that is of Christian decent that has spent any amount of time in a church around the holidays already knows the story. These times spent with my loving family are the only reason that I can spell Frankincense and Mir without having to use my spellchecker or whip out my dust covered bible. Do we really need to see another pint sized Joseph pick his nose, while holding baby jesus upside down with his plastic ass hanging out, while the minute Mary is prompted just off stage because she would rather be playing in the snow than swaddled in a toga and referred to as �the Virgin� a term she is too young to even grasp the meaning of? How many times can we stomach the three wisemen kicking over plastic sheep as they attempt to arrange themselves around a plywood manger scene, complete with palm fronds and stucco ceilings? Last time I checked it was a sin to mock your god and somehow because it is the day of his only son�s birth such religious travesties go unnoticed. This is the same vengeful deity who flooded the world and only let a choice few live, kicked the supposed mother and father of mankind out of his garden for eating an apple and turned one of his most dedicated followers to salt because she glanced over her shoulder; dude isn�t exactly forgiving, now is he?
And through all this, whether you express your joy with a bible or a credit card, the masses keep massing, the weather turns foul and people get nasty with each other whether they are fighting over bible versus or hand lotion; the pattern stays the same. The underlying fact, dear reader, is that you don�t have to fall into either of these groupings or even the ones that are left behind in the cornucopia of flashing lights and religious zealotism or even bow to my extremist view on the whole thing. To understand what true meaning of the holiday season is, stop what you are doing, give a smile to the stranger next to you and remember �peace on earth and good will to men/women� and simply wish them a good day; nothing more, nothing less. Is this too much to ask of the world or even my city, to simply coexist without angst and turmoil for just a single day? Sadly, in this writers over inflated opinion, the answer is a heart wrenching, �why yes, yes it is too much to ask, so why did you even bring it up in the first place?�
With dejection hanging over my head instead of a halo, a sneer replacing my smile and a cattle prod clutched firmly in my hand I will wade through the masses as society dictates. I will not do so gracefully, pushing and shoving just as the masses do all the while braying like sheep and mooing like the bovines that blindly follow along in front of me. And when the time comes someone will greet me with a �Merry Christmas� and I will finally snap. With a furious scream that will send people scurrying for cover I will bellow, �I�m Jewish you son of a bitch� before zapping them with my cattle prod and watch them flop to the ground; the startled �oh fuck� expression still plastered to their face. I will run flapping my arms furiously in an attempt to part the sea of people before me, but before I make my escape I will shout as loud as I can, �PEACE ON EARTH AND GOOD WILL TOWARDS MEN YOU MOTHER FUCKERS!� It is a sad state of affairs indeed that even with something as shocking and jarring as this display, no one will think twice about the words they here and simply walk around the poor Christian soul as the paramedics attend to him; in their mind that�s simply two less people in line ahead of them at the check out counter or the church doors. Peace on earth and good will to men indeed.
New Years, on the other hand is holiday time I completely grasp. Out with the old, in with the new, fresh starts a beginning to a brand new tomorrow full of hope and aspirations all packaged in a drunk 5-8 hour burst. �Should auld acquaintance be forgot and never brought to mind?� Auld Lang Syne, indeed.
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