It's about three hours into Christmas Day and I’m running third shift lab like a zombie. Life is freezing cold and even hot chocolate does not help. So it’s a good thing that I’ve layered up with excess undershirts and whatnot.
Can we remember what it was like in the past when we actually looked forward to the Christmas season? Well, if everyone else can, then obviously I’m of the 5% who doesn't.
I can honestly say that in the past during my teenage years or childhood, there must have been a time when I was always jumping for joy because of the holidays. The idea of a white, snowy Christmas with holiday music, hot chocolate, yummy cookies and cakes, and a nice big scrumptious Christmas dinner consisting of Mom and Dad’s best fixings would always perk up my excitement by multitudes. Christmas was always something to look forward to for reasons that only childhood me could have ever understood.
This year for Christmas, I looked forward to two things: 1) one of my best friends coming back into town and 2) double pay for a worked holiday.
I feel I’ve lost my compassion for the joys of life that eight year old Ani must have enjoyed with all the vigor and energy that she could muster up. The Ani of today has absolutely no energy reserve to even consider getting excited over Christmas candies, cookies, cakes and dinner. Long ago, I lost interest in decorating or sending everyone I knew Christmas cards. If I remember correctly, the last time I even put a Christmas card in someone’s box was back in high school. The last time that I tried to surprise someone with a Christmas gift wrapped up all pretty was sometime in high school as well.
After high school, I got caught up in college and work and simply decided not to go through the trouble of sending cards or wrapping presents. My two closest friends receive gifts of their choosing, unwrapped, I receive gifts from them of my choosing, also unwrapped, we have dinner together and then Christmas is done and over with.
Oh yes, and then there are those work-related parties that I get invited to that I usually don’t attend, as well as the family dinner that sometimes doesn’t happen.
Have I really lost my sense of excitement?
I’ve always been someone who can be easily amused by the little things in life. In fact, I preach the necessity to be able to enjoy simplicity to its fullest, because if you can’t, then the big things that happen just don’t seem as great. But the holidays have become just another chaotic duration of time in which people spend money, eat lots of food and get fairly impatient because everyone else is doing the exact same thing at the exact same time and thus no one is getting immediate service like they think they should be getting.
I swear that around Christmas and Thanksgiving is when I typically see the angriest shoppers in history. People are cutting in line, people are arguing with clerks, and people are shoving each other around. Gifts are bought before Christmas and given away and then two days later everything is returned in the same typical manner as the way they were bought; with lots of shoving and yelling.
Can you see why the holidays may seem a bit depressing from an outsider’s standpoint?
On top of that, holiday bars are the worst to work since everyone’s already spent all their money on gifts and decorations and food and other goodies. And so no one is willing to tip and you leave the bar with a handful of dollars, probably not even enough to pay for the gas that you had to spend getting to work in the first place. Boy am I glad I have a nicer job aside from bartending.
Anyway, for those of you still able to enjoy the lovely Christmas cheer, have a good one and Happy Holidays.
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