"'Tis the Season!"

[urbpan]

Observations by someone who doesn't celebrate a December holiday:


It's weird to see the change in behavior that comes with xmas approaching. When people realize that they won't see one another before the 25th, they suddenly act differently toward each other. I saw people hugging yesterday, that on other days I've heard bad-mouthing each other behind the others' back. I shook the exterminator's hand yesterday, in solemn wishing of happy holidays. Earlier in the month I twice explained that I don't celebrate anything this time of year (to a group of relatively new friends, and to a coworker who asked how my xmas shopping was going) and was twice met with shocked awkward silence. I felt like I needed to apologize or something.

And then, in a couple weeks it won't be "the holiday season" anymore, it will just be winter, cold and icy.

I just think that people put too much importance in this one end of the year festival. Couldn't we measure out our jolliness and generosity and expressions of desire or peace to last the whole year? I'd rather we had quarterly holidays (you know, the "good old days" of pre-Abrahamic seasonal rites) that each had more or less equal weight in significance and energy spent. I celebrated the corners of the year for a while, but I observed that even the self-described pagans I knew had to roll with the xmas juggernaut, to please family, to get through the month at work, many sincerely enjoying it all. Some said "happy solstice," Some decorated exclusively with five pointed stars, some called it "witchmas" or yule or something else. But none put the same kind of energy into the other corners of the year. Who wants to spend all of May shopping and buying decorations for the upcoming Summer Solstice?

I think it's appalling that the economy depends on an orgy of obligatory gift buying in one month to make it through the rest of the year. The cynical detachment of the news organizations reporting on the disappointing "buying season" is a curiosity to me. I can almost understand the dismay of Christians who perceive a holy day being corrupted with secularism and commercialism--but then there's this graph.

It's funny that people who don't celebrate are called "Scrooge" and "Grinch." Those are characters from media products generated for xmas, characters who wake up to realize they are wrong, and at the end embody the spirit of the season and celebrate after all (with great displays of material generosity). Will I someday wake up to the (secular) spirit of the season, just as--after 15 years--I came to decide that raising and killing animals for agriculture was something that I approved of? Will I redeem myself one day, and buy a xmas goose for the Cratchetts and carve the roast beast for the Whos?

This is one of those posts that I've written, but I'm not sure if I should click the "post to urbpan" button; but every other time I've been unsure and done it anyway, readers have enjoyed it or at least had good discussions in the comments. So here I go. sorry.


On this day in 365 Urban Species: Red clover, another post with a freakish photo of a flower blooming in a verdant urban lot in the end of December. Honestly, I was so lucky last year that it didn't ice over until January/February.

Comments

[lizblackdog.livejournal.com]

I love you. This is exactly how I feel about the holidays. I'm one of the ones that rolls with the juggernaut, because my family don't understand that I truly don't care, that I would truly rather opt out - and so I pay it lip service, because I love them and apparently their Special Day would be spoiled if I weren't in it. But I honestly haven't felt any sense of specialness or occasion about it since I was a little girl. I just wish it would all go away and stop interfering with my enjoyment of winter for itself.

[kryptyd.livejournal.com]

I (along with my atheist parents and sisters) always celebrate christmas. I really like it. I like food and I get as much of a kick out of giving presents as the people getting them do. Well, hopefully they do. I love wrapping presents too and decorations. I love catching up wth friends who've moved to other countries too. I love an excuse for drinking (though I hardly need that).

I wouldn't be scandalised by someone not celebrating it though. Me and my boyfriend don't get each other presents for christmas because we're nice to each other all year round (and obviously aren't christians but ARE anti-materialistic).

Someone on another board made the point that if you live in Northern latitudes it's so dark and miserable at this time of the year that it's good to have something to look forward to. Plus I'm getting a load of time off work and a bonus. How could that be bad!

[drocera.livejournal.com]

I wish I could get away with not celebrating this absurd december holiday. And isnt it pathetic that I even have to use the phrase "get away with" when describing my desire to veer away from this custom of excess. That's how ingrained this christmas business is in the psyche of our culture. To opt out is to be viewed as a rouge...no, worse than a rouge - a deviant who may be a menace to society!

That being said - this year I'm still somewhat within the grips of 'normal behavior' in buying gifts, but for the first time ever, I didnt put up a tree. My family thinks I'm positively insane and even worse - a BAD MOTHER - for neglecting this veryimportantthing. My mother even declared that my 14 year old child is going to be 'scarred for life' because of it. I told her that the worst damage was probably already done many years ago when I unwisely ventured into the realm of organized religion and hauled the poor kid to *gasp* sunday school! Ten years later and he still has nightmares about armmegeddon and the second coming of christ, so floridly was it described to his class of 4 year olds by his oh-so-wise sunday school "teacher."


So yeah, this year I'm a semi-barbaric-heathen-menace-to-society. They'll be keeping their eye on me, they will, with this not putting a tree up business! I'm sure the FBI already has ALL kinds of files on you and your non-traditional past! So ya better watch out....

; )

Merry ex-mas (said in Futurama's Santa robot voice)

[umbrellajones.livejournal.com]

You don't rack up credit card debt to get your family things they don't really need that are made by 12 year olds in China who work 12 hour days for 12 cents and hour? How un-american. Wait, I mean un-modern-american.

I support your december! I know your stance on religion, but you should check out the film "What Would Jesus Buy" It puts american consumerism into perspective, not really a religious movie either.

I believe in God. I'm not too sure about Xmas though. The Bible has a few different stories of how it went down, and Jesus never said to celebrate it. The only holiday Jesus said to celebrate, according to the Bible, is dinner with friends.

The holiday season

[(Anonymous)]

>>…many [pagans] sincerely enjoying it.

Well, heaven forbid they enjoy it! ;-)

For myself: I don't like Christian Christmas nor Santa Clause secular Christmas, but I do love deep winter, so I use this time to observe solstice/Yule. "Light in the time of darkness" and all that. Plus the wheel of the year applies to everyone, regardless of their religious/spiritual beliefs. I’m a little surprised a Pantheist wouldn’t be more appreciative of the unique gifts of winter. Beneath the consumerist hubbub there is great quietude while the systems & processes of the earth slow or go dormant. Ultimately, it’s a seasons of rest and renewal and turning inward.

People talk as if they "have to" participate in Christmas madness, but do they really? Maybe those with big families feel more pressure. I've spent time alone reading and baking. I've had some small gatherings of friends that featured hearty seasonal fare like latkes, borscht, homemade eggnog, and mulled wine. It’s largely a matter of where you put your focus, I believe.

I love to send holiday cards too -- it's my favorite ritual. Beautiful letterpressed ones, when I can find them with the right message and aesthetic. This year, I haven't shopped for anything other than the “right” cards and some seasonal music to enjoy in my home (though I'll probably buy a few books or CDs as gifts).

Hole up with cottonmanifesto and the dogs, and raise a glass of mulled wine to the holly king!

Wamest Yuletide wishes to you.

~Flaneuse in DC (who doesn’t really want to be “anonymous” but doesn’t have an account here)

[urbpan.livejournal.com]

WWJB is in my queue! :)

I'm down with dinner with friends, too, although it didn't turn out too great for Jesus.

[interfecta.livejournal.com]

I don't "hate" the winter holiday, because I think if it weren't psychologically important for humans to make some kind of hooplah when the year was darkest we wouldn't have so many of them in so many different cultures. But I do hate what we've done with it.

My husband and I have NO money this holiday -- it's literally a struggle to put food on the table -- and I find myself trying to cover it up as if it were shameful that we're handmaking all our presents. Because I really feel like the season is a covert race to show how well-off you are.

I think it's a particularly nice touch that people are called "Scrooges" if they don't spend a lot of money on lavish gifts, when originally the intent of A Christmas Carol was to praise generosity and decry materialism.

Re: The holiday season

[urbpan.livejournal.com]

I added the sincerely enjoying it line when I realized I was making my pagan friends sound like hypocrites for enjoying it. My only objection is that it robbed me of a community of non-participants.

I’m a little surprised a Pantheist wouldn’t be more appreciative of the unique gifts of winter.
I admit, this is my greatest weakness as a pantheist. (that and my extreme skepticism of all matters "supernatural" or transcendent) I'd be a much more spiritual person if I lived in the tropics (which, self-creating universe willing, I will some day). I'm a life-long New Englander who hates winter--Ironic, but not all that unusual.

I appreciate non-lj users signing their "anonymous" posts.

[sydneycat.livejournal.com]

I have to admit I love Christmas. This year I'm kind of 'bah, humbug' about it for personal reasons but in years past I've loved setting up kitschy displays of Christmas brick-a-brack. Buying just the right gift for people (though preferably something from a non mainstream source). I think of it as a Hallmark holiday with a healthy dose of 'don't mess with my childhood'...and get annoyed at both militant politically correct people for saying ZOMG Christmas is Christian and must be stamped out of the public sphere...AND Christians who claim to be oppressed and that everyone should realize the superiority of their Christmas God and ZOMG stop saying 'Happy Holidays'. I am about as atheistic as you can get without being a complete nihilist. But I see no problem in celebrating a holiday wherein the supposed idea is to exchange love and tokens of affection. *The problem* with all this is that I am not a typical American. I don't want anything that's going to either cause the other person a financial burden to buy or that has obviously been made in the Mariana Islands. Mmmm...slave labor.... Umm...*cough* I *do* try and remember people at other times of the year and often pick up random things or make things for people. I have to admit I'm excited about the scarf and pair of fingerless gloves I'm getting from my friends who are knitters. And in the end...we celebrate and get together as a family on New Year's as in years past some of us were working on Christmas.

[nevers.livejournal.com]

i'm veering toward not celebrating anything. my (atheist) family switched from christmas to solstice when i was in high school at my suggestion, but there's been less and less celebration each year. this year my partner and i are not doing the nice-dinner-together thing or the present-exchanging thing till after new year's when she gets back from visiting family, and i haven't decided if i'm celebrating solstice in any way all by myself, and i have been feeling sort of guilty about my lack of "holiday spirit" and what i perceive as procrastination and laziness.

all of which is to say, it's nice to have the perspective of someone who doesn't celebrate anything and to realize that i don't actually HAVE TO if i want to make the conscious decision not to.

[smallerdemon.livejournal.com]

Holidays and traditions I'm planning on making sure my kids know about in addition to Xmas and Santa Claus:

•Hogswatch (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_Pratchett's_Hogfather)
•Isaac Newton's Birthday (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton)
•Krampus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knecht_Ruprecht)
•Winter Solsitce
•Probably at least one of these every year. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_winter_festivals)

I don't pretend that we can extend our goodwill toward other people throughout the year, though. We often can barely extend our goodwill to our own selves on a regular basis, after all. :)

[rootie-kazootie.livejournal.com]

It seems that at the end of each year, I'm poorer than at any other time during that year. I'm not sure why, or if it's just perception. Point is, I often make my holiday gifts. In my mostly materialistic family, this is not well received. Needless to say, I can always remember what I've given, but rarely remember what I received (unless it's half a towel set because "they" don't approve of my co-habitation without marriage).

I love this post, but I'm not sure I can make it through the holidays, myself, without somehow celebrating the holiday. I feel it's a time to add an additional level of good cheer to an otherwise mundane farewell in the grocery store or unemployment office. I have drawn the line, so to speak, in enhancing my roof line with lights or erecting a dieing tree in my house. Wrapped, home made gifts are all the cheer I need, and "tear down" is over as soon as I haul the gifts to their destinations.
I do dream of the day I can not celebrate the holiday season without being cynical about those who do. That would be perfect.
I have quit celebrating my birthday, the phone calls I receive on that day are nice, because they aren't expected.

[says-bomb.livejournal.com]

LOL!

Great, now I just snorted coffee-with-eggnog out my nose!

[droserary.livejournal.com]

Io Saturnalia! Io bona Saturnalia!

Ba humbug to the other holidays.

[hummingwolf.livejournal.com]

I'm down with dinner with friends, too, although it didn't turn out too great for Jesus.

::snorfle::

I'm so glad I wasn't actually drinking my tea when I read this.

[urbpan.livejournal.com]

I understand where you're coming from, but if this is so, the festival shouldn't come at the first week of winter. Midway between solstice and equinox makes the most sense, where the important holiday of Groundhog day falls.

[http://users.livejournal.com/purplebunnie_/]

Well, you're not the only one. I'm doing what I have to to keep grandmothers happy, but that's really it.

To everything there is a season

[roaming.livejournal.com]

I boycott the holly daze all the time. It gets easier after the first three. I decorate IF I feel like it -- and only in a pagan sort of wish to brighten up the long dark colds season with twinkling faux icicles and red berries for cheer. Mostly the season means to me that I get to sit in front of a fireplace with a big blankie, cats piled on top, next to my honey, drinking hot tea/cocoa/rum toddies, watching Doctor Who or Torchwood or LoTR or whatever -- without feeling badly that I'm lazy bum who ought to be out there DOING something. No, no, I'm all for honoring the fact that nature decrees this is the season for hibernating and conserving energy.

Though as I've grumbled in my own LJ, whenever I've suggested to relatives that they not send me anymore gloves/scarves/gift baskets/gift cards that I don't need and instead DONATE TO SOME ANIMAL WELFARE/RESCUE CHARITY, any amount, I won't ask. . . they act as though I've put hemlock in Santa's eggnog. heh. I've actually come to enjoy being "that rebellious one" like I once was in my teens. :-) Ya for second teenhoods. :-)

[colinftm.livejournal.com]

I was raised without organized religion but a belief that there is a higher power. My bio dad was an atheist for a long time, but now he's a born again and we don't talk much.
My mom often says " I don't want presents, it's not MY birthday". Still doesn't stop me from getting her a little something, but I do that when I can at various times of the year.
I like the tree and everything, it helps with the depressing darkness I am experiencing this time of year. But I refuse to go to my relative's house and "play nice".
I was looking forward to spending the day in a cabin in the woods with my parents and wife, but other family obligations put a stop to those plans. So now the parents are coming over the 24th, we'll open small gifts and eat pizza. The end.

[anais2.livejournal.com]

You aren't alone, by any means; we don't celebrate Christmas, either. But we do take advantage of the time off to get together and have fun with a fireplace and good food.
But "celebrating the holiday" by buying a bunch of stuff we don't want or need? No way.
Eggnog, yes. Consumerism, no.

Another pet peeve? I've lost 2 immediate family members in the last few weeks; everyone keeps sympathizing with "What a horrible thing, right at the holidays"...Like it would be fine in March or August? WTF?
It's almost laughable. But it is so wearing, it has made me avoid people just to keep from hearing it over and over.
Gack.

[buboniclou.livejournal.com]

Reverend Billy FTW!

[buboniclou.livejournal.com]

I felt that way too about Christmas, before I accepted Jesus into my life.

*snort, even though it's true*

Actually, I still do. It's overly commercialized and tacky. But since my family never made a big deal about it beyond putting up a tree and stockings and having oyster chowder Christmas Eve and a ham or a turkey Christmas Night, I found my peace with the presents thing in a happy medium. I just think of it as, everybody I normally buy birthday presents for, gets a second one every year.

[proreality.livejournal.com]

I wholeheartedly agree with you — and it's not because I have a Christmas birthday.
Everything is so commercial and changes so much that it feels false to me. The world's become materialistic and it seems that so many people feel the need to satiate this change. I appreciate your courage to post this though and not care so much if people are calling you a grinch or a scrooge.

Cash can't buy love. It can fake it, sure. It can emulate it, but I don't think it can create it. Just as that is true, I believe that people suddenly making up and kissing like nothing is wrong ... is sort of wrong in itself. But at the same time, I also think that hey, if this is a way to keep people in touch with their otherwise distant families, to keep the kids from playing the gamecube for hours on end because their relatives are visiting, then so be it. I think the issue at hand, and maybe even the bigger picture, is that we rely more and more on money to buy love.

So I guess there's good and bad. It brings us together and closer — but ... not always honestly.

[urbpan.livejournal.com]

Sorry for you loss.

That's a real peeve of mine, too. I really hate when the news idiots claim that some tragedy is more tragic because it happened in the end of December. "And at the holidays, too."

[anais2.livejournal.com]

Thank You.
Actually, tragedies are probably alleviated by the ready availability of eggnog. Just my theory.

[weofodthignen]

But winter doesn't start on the solstice; I don't know why US calendars do that silly thing of pretending the seasons all start at their mid-points! True, it takes a while for things to cool down or warm up, so the seasons always cast long shadows. But this is mid-winter.

I resent being ordered to be happy, and I remember how miserable the Xmas rituals made me as a child. Part of that was being a child; part of it was that England back then was very Xian and there was nothing to do. But it's useful to have one season when all this celebration can be gathered together--when bosses understand that people are dashing around fulfilling social obligations, when bonuses arrive, when there are things like special concerts for those who enjoy them, and Pantos for the rest of us :-)

And an awful lot of it is Yule, not Christmas. Yule is after all a time to gather together, feast together, have a tree and lots of lights . . . Christmas is a time to fast and pray. (So are a lot of the Xian festivals, above all Easter. I'm glad all we motley pagans subverted them!!!

Your point about celebrating all the seasons is well taken. So is your point about gifting each other. (Although isn't that what birthdays and dinner parties are for?) But this is the gathering season.

And as for your point about commerce and hence the economy depending on everyone overspending for Giftmas--yes, it's screwy. So is counting "housing starts" as a major economic indicator as if there was no value in a used house and as if sprawl was great. So is taxing interest on savings if you want people to save. I mean . . . duh! And to go even further, so is not providing healthcare out of taxes . . . you get people missing more workdays than they need to, even dying, and people infecting others . . . how do any of those help the economy? The system's screwy. It's a problem, but being surprised it isn't rational isn't sensible.

Frith,
M

[turil.livejournal.com]

I appreciate marking the cycles of time, mostly. End of the year, middle of the year, changing of the seasons, growth, death/sleep, rebirth, etc. I like feeling the changes.

[elainetyger.livejournal.com]

What it means to me is that when a bad thing happens, we tend to remember it at the same time in years following. My Nana died on Super Bowl Sunday, and I don't remember the date, but I remember her on Super Bowl Sunday. I try to remember all the times that she brightened up my kidhood, but the sadness of her last few comatose weeks is remembered, too, at that time.

Fortunately, I'm not a big fan of football. If a bad thing happens on a day we love to celebrate or during a time we've always anticipated happily, that happy time can be spoiled in years to come. It's as if the holiday betrayed us, in a way. (You were supposed to make me feel *better* dammit!)

Anais, I hope the worst of your mourning can be left behind in this December.