I'm blue.
Christmas is a really hard time for me. I can feel the edges of my contentedness start to lift, curl up and retract during the week of Thanksgiving in the States, and once it gets going, the lifting, curling and retracting continue until I am no longer clothes in contentedness, but standing in my underwear in a swamp of sadness.
It's because I miss my family so much. I miss them all year long, but it hits hardest during the holidays. And for an American, or at least this American, the holiday season starts off slow with Halloween, picks up momentum until Thanksgiving, and then BANG, Black Friday, and the holidays are in full swing. Once Christmas is over, it slows, then rallies again for New Years and then fizzles out for another 11 months.
It's not like that in Australia.
For one, there's no Halloween (although, I do notice it making it's presence more, but don't think it will ever be huge.)
Two: there is no Thanksgiving (and why Australians seem to think that is bigger to Americans than Christmas, I'll never know).
Three: Christmas isn't as big in Australia as Easter is. At least from what I've seen. People LOSE THEIR MINDS at Easter, just like American's do at Christmas.
Four: And again, from my experiences, people here just do not like Christmas. It's deemed entirely too commercial, yet they hypocritically go out and buy things they can't afford to buy, for people they don't even like. My mother-in-law is, in my opinion, the poster child for this.
So.....I have a very hard time at this time of year. I made a good show the first few years. I really tried. I went all out. I thought if I just did what I'd always done, while ignoring that it was hot enough in the kitchen to cook the turkey without using the oven, I'd be able to fake it till I made it. It didn't work, and every year I've been a little less enthusiastic until last year. Last year, I didn't do ANYTHING for Christmas--no tree, no decorations, no Christmas cards, no special foods--primarily because I was so deep in the depression associated with the infertility. I couldn't muster up even the smallest grain of holiday spirit. It took all my energy to not slice open my wrists, so there was nothing left over for anything else. to make matters worse, my husband had to work Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, but really, that actually worked to my advantage because it assisted me in not feeling even worse about NOT doing anything for Christmas.
But this year, I'm not feeling the infertility depression, just the general sadness of not have a REAL Christmas.
what is a REAL Christmas, you might ask. Well, it's not about gift exchange (although I freely admit to feeling like it's not Christmas if I have no one to buy and wrap anything for..gift wrapping is possible the only thing I am good at....and I don't care about getting anything myself. I just like gift giving.) A real Christmas is when you have other people to spend it with other than you and your spouse and the pets. Preferably family, but in their absence, friends. Even just getting together with other "orphans" (mining term for others who have no family nearby, and are stuck in town for whatever reason, usually work.) is better than just the 2 of you.
I know--that sounds really petty. There are a lot of people out there who would LOVE to have just one person to spend the holidays with. But my husband is a holiday grinch (not the same as someone who is melancholy, like me. A Grinch hates Christmas no matter how much the planets line up). Essentially the only thing he likes about a holiday is food, and the subsequent eating of the food. Something he does with aplomb every other day of the year, so the only thing that makes Christmas special with him is the type of food. Like turkey and trifle. 2 things that are only had twice a year: at Christmas and Easter. So........it's just another dinner, just the 2 of us, with fancier food. wooooo. Let me break out the party horns.
A REAL Christmas is also...........a COLD holiday. I realise that Australia is in the southern hemisphere and that in the southern hemisphere December is in the middle of summer. BUT, considering that it's never been anything other than hot in December here, why decorate with Santa Claus rugged up in his red velevet white fur trimmed suit? It's ridiculous. It flies in the face of the obvious. Even Santa has more seasonal wardrobe sense. I'd more expect to see him come in on a surfboard wearing his boardies and sunnies. And Christmas carols. I'll just say the obvious here as well: It's a little hard to sing "White Christmas" with any enthusiasm when you've got sweat running down your ass crack. Deck the Halls? Are you kidding? there are no bows of holly to be found anywhere. It's all dried up and dead! Frosty the Snowman? Please. He wouldn't even be a puddle; he'd be evaporation. Don't even suggest any religious carols, because only 1 in 100 people here worship anything, and it's usually Holden, Toyota, or Yamaha. And other than 12White Boomers, there ARE NO Aussie Christmas carols anyway.
Back to the deocrating: it's just too hot to put up decorations. Christmas decorations are cold weather themed. Just looking at them in the summer heat makes me feel faint. Most people I know say they can't bear the thought of eating ice cream in the winter, because they're already cold and the thought of eating something cold makes them shiver to the bone. Well, that's the way I feel about putting up Christmas decorations in Australia, only in reverse. The site of snowmen, Santa in his red get up, reindeer, and everything with a scarf and mittens on, makes me feel the heat even more. I start feeling like I can't breath, like the air is too hot and humid. Even a Christmas tree appears to radiate heat. (Maybe I should get a white flocked one and use just blue and white lights, for that "cooling" affect?) Who the hell wants to climb all over the roof putting up Christmas lights while simultaneously getting 2nd degree sunburn and blistered hands from the hot surfaces? And sorry, but Christmas lights at night just aren't as pretty if it's not cold, with everything at least covered with a thin layer of frost. It just looks like someone left them up all year and thought, what the hell? They're up, might as well turn 'em on.
Plus, again, it's just the 2 of us. We don't buy gifts for each other--what do you get someone who has everything, who can buy whatever they want, whenever they want? It's depressing to see a Christmas tree with nothing underneath it. In fact, it seems kind of pointless. And now that it's 19 December, it also seems a little late. All that trouble, just to take it down in a weeks time. I usually like to put the tree up on 13 December--the whole 12 Days of Christmas thing--and then leave it up until New Years Day, when we take it down in the afternoon. That way it's up about 3 weeks. That's long enough for me. A lot of people I know put that tree up the day after Thanksgiving. I get that. it's an American thing. Black Friday is the official start to the Christmas season. But like I said above, we don't have Thanksgiving here, and so it's a bit soon. Plus, it's hard enough keeping the tree intact for 3 weeks, much less 5. We have 2 cats. 2 cats + Christmas tree = broken ornaments, bent tree limbs, shredded garlands, rumpled up tree skirt, sparkly cat turds in the litter tray (they eat the tinsel....) and a stressed out Mrs. Couple who, after going through all the effort, likes her tree to look perfect throughout the holiday season.
So there you have it. My Blue Christmas spiel. I mostly think that if I'd been blessed with kids, I might feel differently. But I'll never know. Who knows, I might even feel worse.
I told my husband last night, that this was the last Christmas I'd spend in Australia. He thought I meant that I was going home, for good. I said no, I'm staying here, of course, but I'll be going home to Kentucky every year for Christmas from now on.
He can come with me, or stay here and have it with his family. Truth told, I think it would be better if we had Christmas with our respective families. We can each get what we love the most about the holiday, and then we've got each other the rest of the year. I'm here for Easter, which , as above, he's INSANE about, but that I've never been that hugely excited about (lapsed Catlick here).
Deck the Halls with bows of ...........aww forget it. I'm going to take a cool bath.
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