Merry, er-- Happy Holidays!

Scrooging A Little In The Home Stretch

I am sorry to say I am just not a very Christmas-sy person.

There, I said it.

I don't have any objections to Christmas on religious or cultural grounds; in fact, I don't really have any objections to Christmas at all. And I think the water-heads supposedly trying to "outlaw" Christmas because it offends their tender secular sensibilities should direct their energy and social consciences somewhere else, perhaps at something of more practical concern, like world hunger or class divisions or economic disparity or burning rain forests.

Or they can go fuck themselves, too. I really don't care which.

My disaffection with the holiday season is not based on anti-commercial sentiments, either. I don't have any problem with the "commercialization" of Christmas - in fact I think it may inadvertently help reinforce some basic values we might not otherwise think about too often on our own. People go out shopping this time of year and fight mind-numbing gridlock on the roads and packed strip centers and malls and yet still seem to be basically in good cheer; because it really is better to give than receive, and even more so if one has to make some sacrifices in order to give just the right thing. The overcrowded stores also promote social interaction on a level some of us might not seek out otherwise. It does not matter how aloof one is, one cannot stand in line at Best Buy for two-and-a-half hours and not get to know one's neighbors a little bit, no matter who they are or what they look like; even if only to commiserate about the consistently shitty customer service one finds practically everywhere nowadays. And while tangled up traffic can also promote road rage, it offers multiple opportunities to do something nice for a stranger, by letting him or her cut in line, by yielding that parking spot you have been eyeing for five minutes to someone else and parking instead a half a block further away, or just by holding open a door for someone loaded down with bags and packages. At the very least, one can drop some change in the Salvation Army bucket out front and have a brief sense of good feeling wash over.

While the crassness of the commercial aspects may be a turnoff, it remains that there is no other time of year loaded with so many opportunities to do the right thing, and to be compelled to. If one cannot feel good about oneself and one’s fellow man at Christmas time, then I am not sure one can ever feel good any of that stuff anytime at all.

I feel good about it. It is just that there are some celebrated cultural touchstones regarding Christmas I feel like I must have missed out on somehow.

I don't like Christmas music much, for one thing. Some people I know get almost rapturous in late November or early December when they break out the Christmas music for the first time, digging out some Mannheim Steamroller CDs, a Pat Boone cassette or two, and way in the back of the cabinet there, a scratchy old Harry Belafonte LP that has a great version of "Little Drummer Boy" on it. Too bad about Harry, I think he may be going senile from what I've heard. He always had a great voice, though.

Personally, I am indifferent to almost all of the traditional yuletide musical fare. There are some non-traditional songs I like all right. John Prine's "Christmas in Prison" comes to mind, or maybe the concert version of Bruce Springsteen and Little Steven and the E-Streeters doing "Merry Christmas, Baby." At a holiday get-together once, I was asked what my favorite Christmas song was, and I blurted out Leon Russell's "Stranger in a Strange Land". That brought some vacant stares. Listen to the lyrics sometime, is all I can say.

I got bummed out one time when I realized one of my neighborhood friends had a grandmother who drove a Chevrolet, so he could authentically sing the "Jingle Bells" parody we all thought was so comical at the time, the one with the line about "oh what fun it is to ride in grandma's Chevrolet." My grandma drove a Buick, and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't work that in. What the hell rhymes with Buick?

In addition, I don't have strong nostalgic feelings for Christmases past as some seem to. I have good memories, but part of my problem has to do with growing up with not much extended family around. Other than an aunt, uncle and cousins in Dickinson, who we did celebrate with – that’s one part of Christmas I do remember fondly - the nearest people in my mom's huge family were in and around Pittsburgh, and my dad did not have much of a family left by the time my siblings and I came along. So the concept of huge Norman Rockwell-ish extended family get-togethers, sitting around the groaning board eating goose and brandied plums and bread pudding and such at Christmas-time does not resonate much with me.

We did have a couple of holly trees in the backyard of the first house I lived in while growing up; but it never occurred to any of us to cut some boughs off of one and ‘deck the hall’ with it - our house was nice but fairly modest, a 'starter home' it used to be called, and we only had one hall, anyway.

Another impediment to connecting with the Christmas atmosphere was growing up in a sub-tropical climate. I have seen snow at Christmas exactly once - a few years back - and I am sure my cousins in Pennsylvania would have laughed at it, as it was mostly just a dusting. In fact, it was often warm and humid enough around Christmas to wear shorts and a T-shirt outdoors. When I was 13 or 14 we had a warm front come through off the Gulf of Mexico right before Christmas, and in the course of getting the house and grounds looking nice for company (an obsession of my mother's) I actually had to go out and mow the yard, because the St. Augustine was still growing like it was late July. I remember pushing this heavy old self-propelled Sears mower that didn't self-propel around the yard, sweating my ass off, all the while singing to myself, "Mow the yard and trim the hedges/Fa la la la la, la la la la".

So there you have it, the confessions of one Southeast Texas grinch-like individual.

“When the baby looks around him
It's such a sight to see
He shares a simple secret
With the wise man”

**********

Well, okay, not really. Christmas Eve is my birthday for one thing, and I like that all right. And I will get to see my brother and sister-in-law and their kids, nieces and nephews I don't get to see as often as I like. Plus, I didn't ask for many things, but a couple of the things I did ask for are pretty cool, so if I get any of them. . . You know, this Christmas could turn out to be a good one. Maybe that is why I have been walking around the last couple of days humming that "do you hear what I hear?" song that is playing in my head.

After all the hassle and hustle and bustle, for a brief moment on Christmas morning there is usually a sort of lull; a quiet time between giving and receiving gifts in the living room around the tree, and moving on to the dining room to chow down with the family. And in that quiet time it is possible that some - dare I say? - divine knowledge may possibly be bestowed upon one, and all the things having to do with Christmas, the secular and the religious, the ridiculous and the sublime, are all put in order in one’s mind for a moment.

It is just possible in the brief quietude to hear a faint voice, singing about what it all really means, and why it still matters as much as it does.

”And the baby looks around him
And shares his bed of hay
With the burro in the palace of the king”

He's a stranger in a strange land
Tell me why. . . “

**********

And so it is Christmas, John Lennon once sang. No, the war ain't over, but I am going to try and celebrate anyway, and be thankful for what I can. Merry Christmas to everyone, the indifferent and the disaffected and the haters included. And Peace on Earth, too. Maybe one day.