It caught me off guard. I just sorted through my daughter's Halloween candy this Thursday (and, just between you and me, I have been pilfering from it ever since). Then on Saturday I am flipping through the channels and see that the Hallmark Channel is already showing its particular brand of Christmas movie (i.e. the ones that are so sweet they make you yak) 24/7, and today at Subway over the din of people ordering sandwiches I heard a ghostly 1990's version of Neil Diamond -- a Neil Diamond well past his prime but still with the power to fill the Roanoke Civic Center with adoring middle aged women and their abashed husbands -- wishing me a Merry Christmas in musical form.
I should have known, of course. I and millions of others have noted for quite some time that Christmas comes earlier and earlier each year; it seems that we have finally reached the "All Hallows Eve Asymptote", the line that Schrodinger postulated the beginning of the holiday season might approach but not cross whilst he was taking a break from looking for his cat.
Admittedly, I am something of a humbug when it comes to the Holidays. Christmas in of itself is okay, and its good to spend time with family and friends, and I admit I do enjoy a good Creme Brulee late. Oh, and on Boxing Day there is always a full set of EPL soccer matches, which is a great way to spend the day after Christmas. The British certainly got that one right.
But the Humbugs are many. There are endless days of meaningless and often uninspiring College Football games. There is the crass commercialism. There is the bad music -- Christmas may have produced Handel's Messiah, but it also produced "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer". But most of all, I'd say my problem with the Christmas Season is that I find it impossible to sustain the much expected good cheer over its long length.
Look, as it is, I can store up enough happiness to maybe last three days. After that, external factors come into play. I generally have to avoid books and music. The brunette who works at the Park Lane Tavern on Wednesdays can't call in sick. The Browns have to lose all their football games. Wolf Blitzer needs to keep his beard carefully trimmed at 3/35ths of an inch lest the increased gravitation pull of his whiskers throw off the delicate balance of the moon, wind, and tides, thus varying the progression of ocean waves as they crash into the shoreline while I sit on the beach writing bad poetry. I prefer my waves to have a period between 22 and 29 seconds; anything outside that range can send me slipping into a melancholy of moderate intensity.
So my happiness is a tenuous thing -- too tenuous to last for a couple months, too tenuous to last for the whole Christmas Season.
Ah, but if you look up there are an awful lot of "I"s. Perhaps I have forgotten the....*sigh*.....the true meaning of Christmas. And that is that we have been put on this Earth to "Be Excellent to Each Other", that the fullest lives are those lived in compassion and love for others. Such things may not lead to the happiness that a new I-pad or a Trek road bike or the full set of Aubrey/Maturin novels might bring (hint hint), but it might just be enough to sustain a person for more than three days, and maybe even the whole damned Holiday Season.
I should have known, of course. I and millions of others have noted for quite some time that Christmas comes earlier and earlier each year; it seems that we have finally reached the "All Hallows Eve Asymptote", the line that Schrodinger postulated the beginning of the holiday season might approach but not cross whilst he was taking a break from looking for his cat.
Admittedly, I am something of a humbug when it comes to the Holidays. Christmas in of itself is okay, and its good to spend time with family and friends, and I admit I do enjoy a good Creme Brulee late. Oh, and on Boxing Day there is always a full set of EPL soccer matches, which is a great way to spend the day after Christmas. The British certainly got that one right.
But the Humbugs are many. There are endless days of meaningless and often uninspiring College Football games. There is the crass commercialism. There is the bad music -- Christmas may have produced Handel's Messiah, but it also produced "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer". But most of all, I'd say my problem with the Christmas Season is that I find it impossible to sustain the much expected good cheer over its long length.
Look, as it is, I can store up enough happiness to maybe last three days. After that, external factors come into play. I generally have to avoid books and music. The brunette who works at the Park Lane Tavern on Wednesdays can't call in sick. The Browns have to lose all their football games. Wolf Blitzer needs to keep his beard carefully trimmed at 3/35ths of an inch lest the increased gravitation pull of his whiskers throw off the delicate balance of the moon, wind, and tides, thus varying the progression of ocean waves as they crash into the shoreline while I sit on the beach writing bad poetry. I prefer my waves to have a period between 22 and 29 seconds; anything outside that range can send me slipping into a melancholy of moderate intensity.
So my happiness is a tenuous thing -- too tenuous to last for a couple months, too tenuous to last for the whole Christmas Season.
Ah, but if you look up there are an awful lot of "I"s. Perhaps I have forgotten the....*sigh*.....the true meaning of Christmas. And that is that we have been put on this Earth to "Be Excellent to Each Other", that the fullest lives are those lived in compassion and love for others. Such things may not lead to the happiness that a new I-pad or a Trek road bike or the full set of Aubrey/Maturin novels might bring (hint hint), but it might just be enough to sustain a person for more than three days, and maybe even the whole damned Holiday Season.
It's this time of year that I expect you to dress up as Gandolf and stand up where ever you happen to be when Christmas crosses your path proclaiming, "You shall not pass!".
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile I turn into Gollum the first day of December and cuddle our fontanini nativity and mumble about how you will not takes it from us.