The December 1st Countdown

Cross-posted and archived from DC Metro Moms. Original post date November 26, 2007. 

Growing up white candles dotted each window in our home on Thanksgiving day. When guests would leave we would turn them on and it was officially the Christmas season in our house. That weekend we would all head out to the tree farm and pick out the perfect tree. We would spend hours decorating it and putting up more lights outside. Our house quickly converted into a winter wonderland that wouldn't come down until after January 1. I loved every minute of it and it created beautiful memories for me as a child and an adult.


Now an old married woman I realize I have married the Grinch. How I failed to realize this I do not know. Each year the rules get more stringent than the last. First, it was simply that we didn't put up a tree or decorations until December 1st. This remains the number one rule to this day. This rule is unbreakable. Read that. Un-break-able. It is the Christmas season that brings out the dictator in my spouse. When my mother innocently asked him what he might want for Christmas a few weeks back he shouted, "It's not even Thanksgiving! I will NOT discuss this! Speak to me after December 1st." Er. Um. Yes, sir?

Nothing sets him on fire more than Christmas. He willingly admits that he is a complete and total Scrooge. When asked why, he spouts off a list that includes, materialism, hyper-consumerism, and greed. Fine. I can see that but not in our house. Each year I try to make the season bright. I fill it with love, baked goods, family, spiritual and fun holiday activities. I really work at making that tiny black heart beat red. Each year I feel that I fail. He only sees what he wants to see and that isn't what makes the feeling last all year, but the negative media frenzied mess that is played out live on CNN or FOX News each day. He only sees the sale flyer's coming through the door blanketed in red. He grouses about the lights and that no amount of Christmas cheer shall enter our house until after December 1st. We are not even to utter a Christmas wish, bake a thing, or even think Christmas thoughts.

What ends up happening is a total overdrive on my part. I overcompensate and my Christmas fervor goes nuts all the way until December 1st. And all in secret. Then I become Grinch like as well. I get so sick of the attitude from him that I just give in. Sure we decorate a tree but we don't sit and stare at the beauty of it. We just gloss over the whole season letting his decree be a self-fulfilling prophecy. Now that we have a child I want her to feel immersed in the season and the traditions and not be tainted with the negative all consuming parts of it. I choose not to dwell on that commercialized part. This year I decided to cut back considerably. I have barely uttered a peep about the iron-clad law of December 1st and my wish to break it. I simply stated that this coming weekend I would like to get a tree. Maybe if I just quietly set up the season without him, despite how sad that makes me, it will have an effect. He won't notice the wreath on the door or the advent calendar on the fridge. Maybe, just maybe, our tiny toddler will be our own Cindy Loo Who and make our Grinch smile.

Comments







J. Fergie said...


lmao!! ok, your husband and mine must be friends. i generally just ignore him and go about spreading holiday cheer all by myself. now that the kids are old enough to get excited, it's even better. maybe one day our hubbies will get in the spirit. heck -- even the Grinch loved Christmas by the end of the movie ;)


Reply November 26, 2007 at 02:37 PM Vicky said...


It may also be due to the fact that the man has an entirely unatural albeit hilarious fear of Nutcrackers. "Jaws should not drop like that!" He says and cowers.


Reply November 26, 2007 at 03:07 PM Living By Learning said...


I used to love Christmas cheer, but I'm starting to think like the Grinch. There is something unnatural about sleigh bells ringing in October. That said, doesn't your husband know that the law of the land dictates that holiday lights go up Thanksgiving weekend?


Reply November 26, 2007 at 06:55 PM Jean said...


Even though it's more "correct" to say that Thanksgiving is your favorite holiday, Christmas is my favorite. But even I won't put up a tree until mid-December. We do start advent calendars at the beginning of December and I start getting gifts together early too. But the day after Christmas, I'm DONE. My tree comes down the morning of December 26th.


Thankfully, my husband, a little grinchy himself, lets himself get caught up once the kids and I get excited.

Finding My Holiday Spirit

You would think with all the snow we just had, which has effectively made our street a winter wonderland, complete with tons of black ice, I would be ecstatic.  "It's a white Christmas, everyone! Ho, ho, ho!"  Bah.  I still have cookies to make, presents to put together, and to wrap and lay lovingly under the tree. I say 'lovingly' because right now they are about to be chucked under it while taking a few ornaments off the tree as they find their landing space. 

I am positively dreading the grocery store today.  I imagine after the blizzard and it being the week of Christmas the place will be prone to riots over honey-baked hams while other duke it out for the last wedges of brie.  While I go find my holiday spirit (Does Target still have some? Is it on sale yet?) today I give you this- My Black Heart from December 2006. It's vintage Mummy.  Oooh....


You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch.
You really are a heel.
You're as cuddly as a cactus,
You're as charming as an eel.
Mr. Grinch.


Ooh I'm feeling awfully Grinch-like the last few days. I tried in vain to get into the Christmas spirit by wrapping presents. We've decorated our tree. I've baked cookies, made candy and tied it all with a bow. All to no avail. I just can't seem to pump some well-needed holiday cheer into my now tiny, hardened black heart.


Maybe it's our insane, disjointed schedule. Maybe it's the fact that H and T.D. are always sick lately. Maybe it's the overtime without pay I keep putting in, the endless meetings and rounds of changes at work and lack of gym time. My body hurts from lack of movement. If I don't get my yoga class asap I might snap. Either that or my shoulders will. I am literally on the verge of having a massive temper tantrum the likes of which have not been seen in anyone over the age of three. Unless of course your friends with Paris Hilton perhaps.


It all just came to head today when I realized I still have to buy some gifts, I can't find time to buy groceries again, and I'm already sick of wishing holiday goodness to people. I would rather box their ears. After which I will then crawl into my cave above the town and frown.


I don't know the remedy for this. It might be some vacation time. I have some but I can't take it. Maybe I should just say to hell with it and do it. Just one day. One day to find my holiday spirit and make my heart that has become two sizes too small go back to normal.

The tree is up. Half the lights don't work this year so decorations are being put off for a bit. If I have to say, "No! Don't touch that!" one more time I might go insane. I think the Grinch has visited me this year in the form of sleep deprivation.

I almost committed 'cellular homicide' this morning. Meaning, H kept hitting the snooze button on his cell phone's alarm and I was mere seconds from grabbing it and smashing it into electronic bits. After being up every two hours all night and having only one more hour of sleep before TD woke up with her million question quota to fulfill I was not about to lose one precious second of sleep.

All I want to consume is an obscene amount of chocolate and coffee. And maybe some marshmallows covered in salty caramel (William Sonoma is the devil and if you buy these for me this holiday season I promise to love you forever). If I could live in a Starbucks right about now just sniffing the caffeinated air I would be in a state of bliss not to be believed.

I just finished my first jaunt into the 'Twilight' series hemisphere and I find Bella to be ridiculously annoying. Is it just me or does she complain a bit too much? I can see the appeal of these books but at the same time I'm not diggin' the whole non-real vampire thing/Edward as a bad boy scenario. It's like my Dad always says, "If you say your are crazy, then you're not. If you think you are sane. Well, you're probably a freakin' psycho." So Edward? You sir, are no bad boy. I'm just sayin...

I found Sweetney/Mamapop's piece on extra theatrical trailers for the film to be spot on.