About Christmas

Once upon a time, there was a girl who didn't particularly like Christmas. Every year she thought she would like it, she remembered what it was like to smell cookies and listen to Christmas music and buy presents, and then something would happen. The something was different every year - the headache of trying to find just the right presents, the way people tend to argue at family parties, or the painfully empty chairs that reminded her of the people she'd lost - but inevitably she would turn into a grouch between December 1st and 25th each year. She may even have been called "the grinch" by a few disgruntled friends and sisters.

And then one year... it just didn't happen. She couldn't explain why, because all of the usual things happened: shopping was a nightmare, politics and religion were visited in the same conversation, the best (or worst) family gossip was shared and picked over, and the chairs that should have been filled by the most loving and caring people were conspicuously empty. On top of all of this, the sickly-sweet bubblegum joy of Christmas radio was practically inescapable no matter where she turned. It should have put her off and she knew it, in fact she was waiting for it... only to discover that it didn't.

It wasn't a Christmas miracle. There wasn't any magic, no one fell in love, and she didn't start believing in Santa Claus again, but for the first time in a long time she was able to be with people and share the gift of togetherness instead of focusing on the headaches and stress and expectations.

She wasn't sure what made it so good. Maybe it was maturity. Maybe the desperate wishing for something to change had an effect on her subconscious. Maybe she was feeling sappy and simply didn't notice a lot of the things that should have sent her over the edge. Whatever it was, after five or six years of verifiable grinchiness, she was able to be especially grateful for the family and friends who helped her decorate, played the sickly-sweet bubblegum-joy songs, and chose to spend time with her before and during the holidays. They make life beautiful and make her feel worthwhile, and she can never thank them enough.

And she wanted me to tell you all that. Merry Christmas.

The three words that best describe you are as follows, and I quote...

It's a bit late in the game to be writing this, but among the lessons I have learned at the Post Office is one about Christmas. And I am starting this with 12 minutes left in that blessed day, so I consider myself justified in attempting it, at the very least.

I have been known, among family and close friends, as a Grinch. In some ways it is a wonder that certain of my friends are still my friends, considering their devotion to the holiday. I am fine with the idea of Christmas, particularly when riding the cheery wave of Thanksgiving celebrations, but as the day draws closer I become grouchy and unhappy, and thus much more difficult to live with. I have many excuses for this behavior, but I'll only give you a few:

I have sometimes chosen to explain that I am disappointed by the blatant materialism of the holiday as most of us celebrate it, buying things that no one really needs and that they could just as easily buy for themselves (or that they will exchange so they can buy that other thing they really want). We treat it as everybody's birthday: it's very expensive, and the only people who really benefit are those in marketing.

 Or, I could say that the expectations stress me out. Christmas is supposed to be a cheerful time, full of time-honored traditions and merry-making with friends. Traditions and "merry-making" do not translate into our culture so well - we all want to have all of the traditions and negotiating the making of "merry" with friends with different schedules who are likewise involved in the keeping of all traditions is far too difficult. To top it off, the expectation of cheerfulness makes my sin nature rear up and say, "What? Cheerful? Well, now I'll be the farthest thing from it. On principle."

Finally, what is up with the music? 94.5FM plays only Christmas music from the day after Thanksgiving until the New Year, and while I appreciate their devotion, I swear there are only 20 Christmas songs in the whole world. They are all cheerful. They all talk about traditions that most of us don't have but wish we did (Yule Logs, White Christmas, a real life belief in Santa Clause, or the ubiquitous "sleigh-ride" that no longer has a wide-spread cultural context), which contributes to the stress mentioned in my last example.

On a more personal note, Christmas songs are all about the good old days and the people that we remember. I don't like to miss people. I want them to be here with me. Auld Lang Syne - since when is that a cheerful song? I don't want to miss "auld acquaintance," I don't want them to be gone in the first place.

So. That's the sort of thing I say. I admit I did some grinching this year, and I'm sure my friends and co-workers could give you some great examples, but working at the post office changed that a bit for me.

It's strange that transitioning from school to the night shift at a distribution center could do it. To be honest, when I took the job I breathed a sigh of relief - if I was working 72hr. weeks (as I was told I would be), I could take the holiday in small doses and hide from it when I wanted to. I felt that way right up until my second shift, when I saw the first package covered in colorful paper with the North Pole as the return address. And then the next day I got to do a manual sort - Christmas cards galore, from real people to real people. Lots of mail to APO addresses (that is, military mail), international packages, oddly shaped packages, coconuts from Hawaii pretending to be real packages.


In case you're wondering, you should never put Santa as the return addressee. I have seen too many packages go into limbo because of incomplete or torn addresses and an illegitimate return address. 

It is odd to think that this job, where anonymity is the name of the game, is the one that made me want to spend time with the people who know me, no matter how much stress comes along with it. The postal service is pretty darn quick - inspired by the mail I was sorting, I bought Christmas cards for some of my best friends, wrote notes in them during breaks, and mailed them two days before the big day, fairly sure that they would make it in time - but the extra time, the extra thought required to buy, package, mail, and be on time gave me some hope for this country and our traditions.

I haven't renounced Grinching altogether, and I probably won't until someone decides to write the modern equivalent of the sleigh song and put it to a melancholy tune, but I have made an effort to look for the opportunities in the holiday instead of the deficiencies. So far it's working, and I'm taking advantage of my day off to be with the people I love.

Merry Christmas, to my readers, my non-readers, and the people who play Springstein's version of "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" on the radio ad nauseum. It's not about the stuff, it's not about the cheer, it's about the people. Start a new tradition, one that's about words and time and hours spent "unproductively." It will do wonders for your holiday experience.