Growing up, Christmas was magical. From the decorations and traditions, to the food and massive pile of gifts under the tree, it was everything a kid could dream of … over-the-top and excessive, with a smidge of gaudiness. [We used multicolored lights and homemade ornaments, after all!]
In addition to basically going into debt every year to buy more gifts than we needed, my parents decorated every square inch of our humble home — both inside and out. It was part of the Christmas ritual. So was our annual trek into NYC to see the tree and window displays (Lord & Taylor was always our favorite), light a candle at St. Patrick’s, and sit on “the real” Santa’s lap at Macy’s.
There were other holiday traditions, too. For my parents, it looked like staying up until all hours of the night to build toys, making excuses for not attending midnight mass — again, enjoying a shot of blackberry brandy in honor of my grandfather (and I use the word “enjoying” loosely), nibbling on cookies and tossing the milk before writing Santa’s note (mysteriously in my father’s handwriting), and forgetting where one gift is because my mother never wrote down her hiding places. For my sister and me, it was searching the house for hidden presents (I was always the lookout), baking Christmas cookies and writing our note to Santa, performing horribly choreographed musicals with our cousins (at the misfortune of our collective parents), ruining our dinner by eating too many pigs in a blanket, and watching Emmet Otter’s Jug Band Christmas, Nestor the Long-eared Donkey, and The Sound of Music in our new Christmas pajamas.
When I became a parent, I borrowed many of the same traditions and added a few of my own, like breakfast with Santa, cutting down our own tree, ice skating under the stars, sprinkling reindeer dust on the front lawn, and yes, welcoming that damn Elf on the Shelf into our lives (FYI, I refused to be “creative” — just remembering to move him was stressful enough).
Now that my kids are older, or maybe it’s because I’m older, our Christmas tradition is not having any Christmas traditions. We haven’t even had a tree the past few years (mainly because we weren’t home). For awhile, we traded in “things” for “experiences,” and jumped on a plane on December 24 for a family vacation. Everyone got to choose an event or excursion for us to enjoy together over the course of the week, and that’s how we celebrated. But then high school basketball holiday tournaments got in the way … IYKYK.
Now that the kids are grown and I’m old, Christmas involves far fewer presents and is basically a total crap shoot. Nearly all traditions have been abandoned, and I’m okay with that.
Last year, with COVID Christmas, we didn’t decorate or even celebrate. This year, we will be celebrating on a small scale with family in NY, but I’m still not decorating. I’m the first to admit that the older I get, the more Grinch-like I become; I just don’t get any joy out of the decorating experience anymore, so I’m not doing it. If my kids were younger, I’m sure I’d feel guilty about this, but at nearly 16 and 19, they don’t care — so neither do I.
Life is too short. Celebrate, don’t celebrate. Decorate, don’t decorate. Do what makes you happy. For my mother, that still means setting up her ever-expanding Christmas village and hanging mistletoe from every doorway. For me, it means not doing any of those things and not worrying about how it looks. That brings me true joy, and isn’t that the point anyway?
Happy Holidays, everyone … however it looks for you!
-LJDT
