The Season
Dec. 1st, 2005 03:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lenora_roseThere's a fantabulous discussion of a bit of Jerry Falwell idiocy here at ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
wicked_wish's journal. It wanders a fair bit, and she's right to be astonished at a discussion that is simultaneously deep disagreement and civil discussion.
This, however, leads me to point out one thing that never seems to be mentioned:
Christmas is condemned as overly commercial. And yes, I loathe the mall Christmas music (Though I like real, good Christmas music of the sort no readios ever play), and I loathe that some season-related commercials come out even before Hallowe'en.
But it's also funny - for the most part, we're shopping for other people. We're not being selfish in our commerce. We're not thinking about commericalism. We're thinking about "Hey, wouldn't she LOVE that?"
Well, I am. I concede that I also sometimes peek at stuff I've been wanting. But My Wish List is done, made, until January. I update it through the year, as I buy things or things come out, then ban myself from further changes or interest after a certain time.
Anyhow. These are the things I loathe about the season:
- Severe crowds. I have a pretty good capacity for crowd-weaving, in spite of my hip size, but it can still be wearing weaving through tons of people.
- Bad bad bad Christmas music piped through malls. TJ Dawe has a great rant about this in the Slip-Knot, culminating in the "Christmas song from the Exorcist", IE, Carol of the Bells.
- Stupid Christmas sale commercials
- Worse Boxing Day/Week sale commericals.
- People trying too hard to Put Christ back in Christmas
- People trying too hard to take Christ out of Christmas, or to pretend that Christmas is more Secular than Christian, or to pretend be open to the other seasonal celebrations. (Note, pretend. I'm all for sincerely being open, but too often it's based not on sensitivity but on knee-jerk "we should be correct".)
But what do I like?
- Finding the perfect unexpected thing for a friend. Finding aesthetically beautiful cards.
- putting up the tree, with pretty decorations, and other handsome and not kitschy decor. (This year, this will be prefaced by some significant cleaning endeavours... but oh, well)
- wrapping presents in creative or silly ways (In this, I acknowledge that I am exceedingly weird. Jeff hates it with a passion.) Looking at said stacks of presents and chuckling evilly.
- hiding other peoples' gifts in plain sight. (This was especially fun to do to mom.)
- seeing the rest of the extended family who live in town (Cousins, etc). Not much to add to that, so it looks smaller than it is. The only reason missing out on that gathering was acceptable last year was that we were having family get-togethers with the side of the family I hadn't seen for TEN YEARS instead.
- Good Christmas music. Which, even in my pagan and agnostic years mostly seemed to be the religious side, and almost never involved covers by people who actually get on the radio. Good examples: Heather Dale's This Endris Night, various things by Maddy Prior and the Carnival Band, Loreena McKennitt's works. And I have a weak spot for the Grinch and the music from the Nutcracker (The full ballet, or selections therefrom, not the Suite.) I would have added choir music to that, except that I don't have too many good choral versions of the pieces, and this is the first year I've been in a choir since High School.
- Watching the Grinch (The 22 minute cartoon. There is no other version, there never was, and don't utter the words Jim Carrey anywhere near me.) I'm not as attached to Charlie Brown, I don't have to see that every year. But it's nice.
- And yes, I like the whole church services and religious ceremony attached. Partly for Grandma and partly because it was tradition, I attended Christmas services for many of the years when otherwise, I didn't attend church. Not every year, but more of them than you'd expect, considering the ten-year pagan phase.
- peace, love, goodwill towards men.
- Luke, 2:1-14 . (Also now a fandom tradition, upheld mostly bytnh)
wicked_wish's journal. It wanders a fair bit, and she's right to be astonished at a discussion that is simultaneously deep disagreement and civil discussion.This, however, leads me to point out one thing that never seems to be mentioned:
Christmas is condemned as overly commercial. And yes, I loathe the mall Christmas music (Though I like real, good Christmas music of the sort no readios ever play), and I loathe that some season-related commercials come out even before Hallowe'en.
But it's also funny - for the most part, we're shopping for other people. We're not being selfish in our commerce. We're not thinking about commericalism. We're thinking about "Hey, wouldn't she LOVE that?"
Well, I am. I concede that I also sometimes peek at stuff I've been wanting. But My Wish List is done, made, until January. I update it through the year, as I buy things or things come out, then ban myself from further changes or interest after a certain time.
Anyhow. These are the things I loathe about the season:
- Severe crowds. I have a pretty good capacity for crowd-weaving, in spite of my hip size, but it can still be wearing weaving through tons of people.
- Bad bad bad Christmas music piped through malls. TJ Dawe has a great rant about this in the Slip-Knot, culminating in the "Christmas song from the Exorcist", IE, Carol of the Bells.
- Stupid Christmas sale commercials
- Worse Boxing Day/Week sale commericals.
- People trying too hard to Put Christ back in Christmas
- People trying too hard to take Christ out of Christmas, or to pretend that Christmas is more Secular than Christian, or to pretend be open to the other seasonal celebrations. (Note, pretend. I'm all for sincerely being open, but too often it's based not on sensitivity but on knee-jerk "we should be correct".)
But what do I like?
- Finding the perfect unexpected thing for a friend. Finding aesthetically beautiful cards.
- putting up the tree, with pretty decorations, and other handsome and not kitschy decor. (This year, this will be prefaced by some significant cleaning endeavours... but oh, well)
- wrapping presents in creative or silly ways (In this, I acknowledge that I am exceedingly weird. Jeff hates it with a passion.) Looking at said stacks of presents and chuckling evilly.
- hiding other peoples' gifts in plain sight. (This was especially fun to do to mom.)
- seeing the rest of the extended family who live in town (Cousins, etc). Not much to add to that, so it looks smaller than it is. The only reason missing out on that gathering was acceptable last year was that we were having family get-togethers with the side of the family I hadn't seen for TEN YEARS instead.
- Good Christmas music. Which, even in my pagan and agnostic years mostly seemed to be the religious side, and almost never involved covers by people who actually get on the radio. Good examples: Heather Dale's This Endris Night, various things by Maddy Prior and the Carnival Band, Loreena McKennitt's works. And I have a weak spot for the Grinch and the music from the Nutcracker (The full ballet, or selections therefrom, not the Suite.) I would have added choir music to that, except that I don't have too many good choral versions of the pieces, and this is the first year I've been in a choir since High School.
- Watching the Grinch (The 22 minute cartoon. There is no other version, there never was, and don't utter the words Jim Carrey anywhere near me.) I'm not as attached to Charlie Brown, I don't have to see that every year. But it's nice.
- And yes, I like the whole church services and religious ceremony attached. Partly for Grandma and partly because it was tradition, I attended Christmas services for many of the years when otherwise, I didn't attend church. Not every year, but more of them than you'd expect, considering the ten-year pagan phase.
- peace, love, goodwill towards men.
- Luke, 2:1-14 . (Also now a fandom tradition, upheld mostly by
tnh)
