I thought about using this picture on the Xmas tree thread, but here might be a better place 😉
@RadiantHugs I loved your whole post. And your personal protest to Christmas commercialism is great. I don't buy Christmas gifts. I treat Thanksgiving a lot like Christmas, other than sending about a dozen Christmas cards. I put them in the mail one or two at a time because I worked for the post office and putting 20 or 30 cards in the mail at once in late December is a real strain for the employees. Less is more when it comes to Christmas.
I hate all of them. Can they please be over?
I would happily just ignore Christmas all together. I can't hang around my family cause there all homophobes so I am hanging with my exs family. They all decided to come to my place to celebrate to make it "easier" for me an my special needs kidos but ill probably just end up driving around while my older kid has a meltdown and waiting for them to leave my house. For Thanksgiving I just stayed home an did nothing and it was wonderful. I use to be so close to my family and love the holidays.. now they just suck
I have thankfully fallen into a groove where there is 0% drama during the holidays and the 4 I celebrate from oct-jan are lots of fun 😌 I am even not destroying a year’s worth of progress between thanksgiving and the new year 🍻
OMGOSH!!! Did anyone know that we have a HOLIDAY for today? Talk about making a worldwide decision based on a singular perspective about a celebration? Is this really about an EVERYBODY holiday? Or just a demographic of people celebrating Christmas?
I honestly do cringe about a week before Halloween. It’s all a lot of stress and expectations now. I don’t need anything from family and friends except expressing care and kindness to each other, enjoying time together. I wish we could take the shopping, buying gift giving pressure out of Christmas! It makes me feel guilty to receive gifts that someone spent $$ on and especially if I can’t reciprocate to the same degree. Maybe it’s just the Adulting part of the holidays, it was much better as a kid! The fun of ‘make believing’ 🎅🏼
Although I am now an atheist, I was born and raised Jewish. Despite living in a very Jewish neighborhood, I always felt a bit of resentment toward Christmas. It felt like something that was being pushed at me. Oddly, as I age, I find that (except for incessant Christmas music), I resent it less and less. It now just seems to be no sillier than any of the rest of religion.
@carrieanne - You really don't need to feel guilty about receiving gifts, no matter how expensive. In all likelihood, (with the possible exception of very close family) the people who give you those gifts are doing so because it makes them feel important. Don't deny them their pleasure.
Omgosh. Totally bringing this back because “it’s that time of year again…”
I know there are those who LOVE the season but this thread is not about that.
This is about those who do NOT love this time of year…
I got this funny tik tik from a friend….
https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT8P3sGdH/
Sort of some of the crazy that is the season.
For me I hate the ugliness in people around the “shopping craze” So so so CRINGY
If I’m buying/getting gifts from someone I’d rather them match our relationship/personality like THIS… 😂
This thread feels absolutely necessary this morning.
I hate that the holidays bring so much pain to people that don't have what they feel they need to experience joy.
For example....
My mom is really struggling because her family is spread out and can't all make it to the same state for Thanksgiving. It hurts her heart so much because she has a dream of a big table with Thanksgiving goodies and everyone gathered around. Even though we get together for lots of things separately, she feels..... sad.
I'm not sure that there's a cure for the Martha Stewart magazine feeling of what love/family/holiday happiness should look like.
I hate that part.
What about you? What's your ick about the holiday season?
The hyperconsumerism.
A well known discount retail chain had a policy of destroying all unsold seasonal products before discarding it all in the trash.
That's such a waste of resources, energy In manufacturing and transportation, time and money, etc.
I prefer to focus more on the reason for the season and sharing time with friends and family.
@sillysassy Thanks for reviving an interesting thread. I understand how your mom feels and it’s so difficult to make the holidays perfect, life happens. @TxTom I totally agree. I’m so over the commercialization part of the holidays. What I wrote 2 yrs ago still applies.
I will celebrate Thanksgiving with American/Korean friends here in Seoul. I want to find ingredients to make some traditional American dishes.
@sillysassy reading through this thread for the first time I noticed something about you: your affinity to gifs may match my own 😄 .... ... but that was off topic.
The stress of everything needing to be done all at once and the family strife that inevitably ensues is my least favorite part of these holidays. Ironically, the holiday of being thankful and the holiday of giving always seem to be surrounded by the most chaotic events and strife that come out of nowhere.
Now, I still like Thanksgiving and Christmas ... but that is probably because I am insane 🤪
Last year was my first set of holidays without immediate family. I stayed home for most of them. I myself celebrate the winter solstice or Yule as I call it. As I try to do, I had that with friends. I haven’t gotten together on Yule in awhile. It was good to be with Chosen family.
In regards to presents, I stopped giving them for holidays. I took the advice of Bill Murry at the end of Scrooged, one of my favorite movies. I don’t wait anymore. When I find something I like, I give it to the person. Especially little things.
Just the loss of the sense of magic that Christmas used to carry for me. Comes from getting older and more jaded I think, and just the whole milieu of the holiday season isn't what it used to be. But this year may be a rebound.
Thanksgiving...I dread it. I'm a vegetarian who doesn't like sports. But I've had some pivotal bad memories and triggers on that holiday. Disowned a sister on Thanksgiving too (don't worry, she was so atrocious that she's banned from events for life). My ex always had the kids on Thanksgiving, he's dead now...That doesn't even touch on my childhood...11 kids who rarely got a full supper, the holiday was a little too surreal. Last Thanksgiving I spent with a 98-year-old lady in my home care job. One of the better holidays because I got to help someone not feel lonely on Thanksgiving.
@Auroradream I'm sending you a hug!
The TV ads pushing you name it, especially the ones with Christmas music to sell cars.
It will be better once my mother in law is gone. Lol. I will probably mis annoying her.
Though I am unexpectedly in the mist of job searching right now, that's really my only ICK at the moment...Not having a job right now. Lol!😁 I got a lead on another job, just waiting on word about my drug test/criminal background results. 😄👍
I am still (hopeful😁) and Iooking forward to the holidays, on Thanksgiving my son and I goes to my mother's house to eat and hang out with her. 😁🦃
On Christmas 🎄 🎁 🧑🎄, she usually would come over to hangout, eat with us as we exchange presents with each other..But due to weather issues like bitter cold snaps🥶❄️☃️ and/or freezing rain 🌧️❄️🥶 she hasn't joined us on Christmas Day in about 2 years.🙁 After Christmas Day passes, then it's on to celebrating my son's birthday he surprisingly came to me making a "special request of restaurant" to eat at on his special day.Lol! 😄 It was adorable how he came to me with his request (which tells you, that he never requests much😉😄) I won't mention said restaurant here (as I'm not sure how CC mods would take it, so I will just avoid mentioning said establishment ☺️)...Lol! 😁 But due to the "obvious" nature of the place, I WILL just simply say:
"Teenage boys, they don't miss a thing at that age do they? Geez!"
😄😄😄
In addition, when he told me his request...At first I said NO! 😑🚫
Lol 😆😆😆
But I soon came to realize that "NO" was a total ME issue, I still see him as my "little bubble headed boy" and I am struggling at getting a strong handle on that ME issue at times.🙁😏🙄😁 Due to him growing up into the tall, hairy teen boy that I NOW see before Me...So yeah, it's been a struggle as his mother ACCEPTING THE FACT that he isn't so little anymore!😆😬
So in the end I went to him to apologize and I reneged on my "NO" and decided that we will go to his requested restaurant on his birthday. 😁🥳
Omgosh. @Katota 😂 I know about teenagers. Thank goodness he has a Momma that loves him. (And hopefully things are going well in the job search.)
This movie. Omgosh. Any Moms out there struggling with everyone’s opinion of what they should be doing these holidays? Sigh. 🤨
This was a good reminder of what NEEDS to happen!!
I should have mentioned that the Moms Christmas is R RATED! Proceed with all caution you deem necessary. 😳
Question. For those who hate the holidays.... I am curious. I just learned that Advent happens during the 4 weeks of December. Each week celebrates a different emotion.
Hope Peace Joy Love
Here's my question. Is it possible that this intentionality could be used in such a way as to help your life and the world around you in a positive way? No matter if there's any kind of religiosity involved.
I was thinking about getting ready for the New Year and what kinds of things I like to reflect on before changing over the calendar, and it was kind of interesting reading about these four weeks in December. Is it possible to hate the holidays, but still find a way to be a part of a better world?
Thoughts?
Winter solstice (commonly known as Yule) celebrations are about the triumph of light over dark. The darkest day is done and things are getting lighter (and soon, warmer) again. It is a time of hope and joy, of awakening. It's easy to look forward to it. After all, this too shall pass.
Peace and love should know no time constraints. They should be all year round. That said, even if something is with you all the time, it is still always worth celebrating. I personally like them being celebrated at the solstices and equinoxes and the cross-quarter holidays. They can be both an offering and a wish.
As for me personally, I fight so that others may enjoy hope, peace, joy, and love. And being among those others or even just seeing them happy and safe is a great reward to me.
@sillysassy @IronLemon I appreciate these positive and hopeful comments, a great reminder for the season no matter our circumstances.
Getting back to what this thread is about—why some of us may not like the holidays, I think it all falls on a spectrum. I enjoy Halloween as do dentists and confectionary businesses and it is a holiday that has no expectations as to what you should feel. Thanksgiving is a great one to reminisce about what I should be thankful for and is in some ways a good reminder to pause and give that a thought. The food is not important to me, nor is the story behind it.
But Christmas is a mixed bag. I could care less for the religious meaning behind it and if that makes someone happy good for them. It is not the reason for the season for me and a lot of people. The materialism prevalent during the season is to be expected in a capitalist society and overall it is a big indicator of how American households feel about the economy that year by how much they spend.
And when my kids were young I loved watching their faces at Christmas time, knowing that growing up they will have a different relationship with the holiday. My daughter in particular recognized the artifice behind it all at an early age.
But for me personally, Christmas is a reminder of one of those human iniquities—war. As a child of a career military officer during the Vietnam War I did not have my father for three Christmases. And one Christmas on a year before my dad shipped out for a second tour, my best friend’s dad was killed in action a week before he was supposed to go home for good. Military families lived in close quarters during this time and my best friend lived next door and I witnessed the whole thing unfold including the day the news was delivered. I have no words to convey the amount of anxiety and stress a child goes through knowing the possibility your parent may not exist from one day to the next and seeing what might happen to you play out all around you. You attend more funerals on a military base than any child should ever see and you pictured your parent in the casket every time. And I was old enough to witness changes in my mom even as she tried to maintain a sheen of normalcy. But she started chewing her nails, crying at night in her room and probably suffering from depression for which little to nothing was done to help at that time. I knew she never forgot how she gave birth to me while my dad was one of the many dealing with the October missile crisis with Cuba and she was alone for six months, but war was a different animal and on a different level and this war was televised. Yeah, the experience marked me for sure.
So Christmas is just a reminder of the horror humans do to other humans in the concocted name of borders and political intrigue. War is sick and made sicker during a season that expects you to think happy thoughts. Everyone has an inner child inside each of them and that is normally a good thing. My inner child relives that corrosive feeling of intense fear and loss from decades ago every Christmas—so not a holiday I admire or look forward to.