Humbugalicious

It's evil- sparkly, shiny, delightful evil!

My father was a rapid-cycling bipolar with Narcissistic Personality Disorder. You can imagine what my childhood was like, and what it was like for my mother to be married to him. She turned herself into a cipher, concerned only with what he wanted and keeping him happy- except when it came to Christmas.

My mother loves Christmas. She listens to Christmas music all year round. She goes to the Hallmark store and buys expensive ornaments year round. She has three artificial trees that she decorates, beginning the day after Halloween. And she never let my father touch Christmas. There was joy in my house- a bit ruthlessly enforced, perhaps, but joy- during the Christmas season.

I think you can see why I love Christmas.

Tom, at Just Truth, does not. In fact, he hates any Christmas that is not entirely focused on Jesus, and Santa can suck it. He even has a picture of Santa as a horrible, fanged creature, which I found a little upsetting. Tom, commits what I consider a sin, in the way atheists use that word: he assumes that people who think differently do so for malign reasons. I think Santa is great, I celebrate in a secular way, but I do so not because I am a different person with different ideas, but because I am greedy and evil.

The other Christmas, is the one most of the world, and an ever-growing number of Christians celebrate. The Christmas of greed, getting the best deal, plowing over people in target to get grandpa the $200 plasma TV. Knocking out the neighbor for the last pack of silly bands, or going ever deeper into debt so little suzy can have “the best Christmas ever” and only briefly (if then) do thoughts turn to Christ..His birth, His gifts of eternal life, or even dying on the cross for us. This is the Christmas the world knows and loves the one where adorable, obese; grandpas are exalted, and worshipped. How many people would stand in line for hours to get their picture taken with Jesus? How many would stand in line to see Jesus?

You missed the third option, Tom. You missed my Christmas. I like pretty lights and red and green decorations. I like baking cookies and giving them to people who don't expect them: the bus driver, the convenient mart clerk, the Dunkin' Donuts crew*. I like Christmas carols and teasing my nieces and nephews about their gifts ("you didn't want a big, red inflatable plastic pig? That is such a shame!"). I like A Christmas Story and Christmas cards and Christmas dinners with everyone crowded around a table for four and kids hopped up on sugar bouncing around the house eagerly anticipating Santa. I don't give a shit what I get or great deals or anything else. I just like Christmas.

Yeah, I'm not you, but it doesn't make me evil. It also doesn't make my enjoyment of Christmas, different though it may be, any less sincere or any more evil.

*Guess who gets to loiter at the convenient mart? That's right, this woman!