And that's why therapy. Right there.
The holiday season. It's upon us. And I say that while holding two equal yet utterly differing points of view in my head:
1) Yay holidays! Thanksgiving and Christmas and food and parties and friends and family and claymation TV specials about reindeer and snowmen, and holiday music and eggnog spiked with whiskey just like Grandpa used to make!
2) Fuck.
Holidays weren't battlegrounds when I was a kid. Or at least if they were, I was blissfully ignorant of it. I don't ever remember my family arguing over religious observations versus secular ritual. No disagreements about commercialism taking over everything, or how we had to respect everybody's holiday traditions, or fist-fights about whether it should be called a "Christmas" tree or a "Holiday" tree. (Which, for the record: in my house it's a Christmas tree. Not because I'm working hard to "keep Christ in Christmas," but because it's ALWAYS been called a Christmas tree in my family. Also I've checked, and Christ isn't actually IN my Christmas tree, because if he was it wouldn't BE a Christmas tree, it would be a Jesus tree, and I would charge people to come into my house and watch me cut down the Jesus tree only to watch it rise again. How awesomeness would THAT be?)
Do you see the screaming child? Do you see the benevolently smiling Santa having to physically restrain the screaming child, so that he does not jump off the lap of the elderly, brightly dressed STRANGER that his parents just plopped him down on? (I have no actual memory of this event, and it's pretty obvious from the look on my face that I am aggressively trying to suppress it, even as it's happening. I really hope I pissed in his lap.) Why as adults do we work so hard to make moments, instead of just letting them happen?
The holidays are a stress category all by themselves. And I know this. Because I watch Family Feud. This year promises to be more than the usual stress, and that's largely (but not entirely) because I went and fucked things up in my own home, and now there's that on top of holidays, and I don't know if there's enough booze in the universe to make it even a little bit functional, but I absolutely intend to find out. What I'm going to TRY and do is just let the holidays happen, and not try to pretend that everything is all holly wreaths and roast duck and candy canes up my ass. If my daughter doesn't want to sit on a jolly fat man's lap (she's ten now, she fucking better not want that), then I'm not going to make her. And if she wants to be a little sad, or a lot, because of how things are this year, then I'm going to let her. That's not a Burl Ives song, but it's honest. (If you don't know who Burl Ives is, you're too young for this blog. You can only keep reading if you promise to Google him, but I'm warning you now, he's dead. Also, his music was kind of sappy. Hence the reference. This shit all makes sense in my head.)
I hope you have an awesome couple of months just letting shit happen. Instead of - you know - making shit up.
See what I did there?
LB
Holidays weren't battlegrounds when I was a kid. Or at least if they were, I was blissfully ignorant of it. I don't ever remember my family arguing over religious observations versus secular ritual. No disagreements about commercialism taking over everything, or how we had to respect everybody's holiday traditions, or fist-fights about whether it should be called a "Christmas" tree or a "Holiday" tree. (Which, for the record: in my house it's a Christmas tree. Not because I'm working hard to "keep Christ in Christmas," but because it's ALWAYS been called a Christmas tree in my family. Also I've checked, and Christ isn't actually IN my Christmas tree, because if he was it wouldn't BE a Christmas tree, it would be a Jesus tree, and I would charge people to come into my house and watch me cut down the Jesus tree only to watch it rise again. How awesomeness would THAT be?)
Do you see the screaming child? Do you see the benevolently smiling Santa having to physically restrain the screaming child, so that he does not jump off the lap of the elderly, brightly dressed STRANGER that his parents just plopped him down on? (I have no actual memory of this event, and it's pretty obvious from the look on my face that I am aggressively trying to suppress it, even as it's happening. I really hope I pissed in his lap.) Why as adults do we work so hard to make moments, instead of just letting them happen?
The holidays are a stress category all by themselves. And I know this. Because I watch Family Feud. This year promises to be more than the usual stress, and that's largely (but not entirely) because I went and fucked things up in my own home, and now there's that on top of holidays, and I don't know if there's enough booze in the universe to make it even a little bit functional, but I absolutely intend to find out. What I'm going to TRY and do is just let the holidays happen, and not try to pretend that everything is all holly wreaths and roast duck and candy canes up my ass. If my daughter doesn't want to sit on a jolly fat man's lap (she's ten now, she fucking better not want that), then I'm not going to make her. And if she wants to be a little sad, or a lot, because of how things are this year, then I'm going to let her. That's not a Burl Ives song, but it's honest. (If you don't know who Burl Ives is, you're too young for this blog. You can only keep reading if you promise to Google him, but I'm warning you now, he's dead. Also, his music was kind of sappy. Hence the reference. This shit all makes sense in my head.)
I hope you have an awesome couple of months just letting shit happen. Instead of - you know - making shit up.
See what I did there?
LB
Great blog, it takes guts to get on here and be real. Keep it up.
ReplyDeleteDidn't know you dabbled with blogging and writing, Larry.
ReplyDeleteBut you should definitely do it more often; this is good stuff.
As the first time father of a not-quite-2-year-old boy, I'm determined to NOT be that parent that fucks Christmas up by making it about forced moments and memories. I agree whole-heartily with your sentiment of "just let it happen."
Merry Happy Holiday Christmas Festivus Thanksgiving to you and yours, Larry.