I woke up this morning in a largely
un-Christmassy house as Mandi had got up before me to tackle the task of taking
the decorations down. The whole of the downstairs had been done so I don’t know
what time she woke up, the decorations in the bedroom were still up but it was
nice to see all our regular pictures and ornaments back where they belong, and
of course it is always nice to have my office doubling up as a dumping ground
for Christmas decorations. Although we are two days early taking them down, it
made sense to do it today to give us a clean start to normality tomorrow when
we, along with the rest of the world, return to work. There is something quite dispiriting
about coming home from work to a twinkling festive land on the other side of
the holiday, which got me thinking about our attitude to Christmas on either
side of December 25th.
Take for example the Christmas jumper; once
the preserve of Noel Edmunds and the office dickhead who describes himself as ‘wacky’,
and now the ultimate symbol of kitsch that it is acceptable to wear out of the
house in the run up to Christmas Day. Workplaces have Christmas jumper theme
days and all walks of life can be seen wearing them, even the rolled up
trousers and silly hat brigade. I wore a Christmas jumper when we went out for
a meal on Boxing Day and a child told me that it wasn’t Christmas anymore.
Boxing Day isn’t Christmas anymore? Surely Boxing Day is better than Christmas
Day isn’t it? Christmas Day has stress and pressure whereas Boxing Day is just
a day to laze around and take it easy but according to a passing group of
ragamuffin kids it was no longer Christmas. To be fair, if you’re a child
wandering the streets on Boxing Day I can’t imagine Christmas being that big a
deal to you so they probably learned from their parents that Christmas is a one
day event. You don’t see a Christmas jumper though on this side of the holiday
and there’s no reason why you shouldn’t. Does nobody celebrate Christmas as a
holiday rather than a day anymore? I know I wasn’t particularly enthusiastic
about Christmas this year, but I was always a big supporter of the ethos that
Christmas lasts until January 6th; it is just unfortunate that the 6th
falls wrong and so people have to go back to work during the holiday like this
year for example when we all trundle back to the grindstone on Monday 5th.
Nobody sees anything wrong with exchanging
presents after the 25th if you haven’t seen the person before the
big day, but have you ever received a Christmas card later? If someone handed
you a card on December 28th you would think it was an afterthought
but, yet a Christmas card is a greeting that wishes people well during Christmas
so why can’t we send or receive them throughout the holiday?
It’s nice to see that a lot of shops (and
banks etc) still have decorations up at this time of the year, but it is
equally sad to see the haste in which supermarkets and department stores
relegate Christmas items to the ‘reduced to clear’ shelf. Christmas music is
another one, ubiquitous until Christmas Day and suddenly wiped from the
memories of radio stations, music channels, and shopping centres on Boxing Day.
Even the Winter Wonderland in the middle of town has done away with festive
tunes in favour of bland pop, (although as it’s sponsored by Capital FM they
are probably playing the same six songs on a loop, I’ve never stuck around long
enough to find out). Television does a little bit better to keep Christmas alive;
the idents stay Christmassy until New Year’s Day at least, and there are still
a smattering of Christmas specials to enjoy (although there seems to be a new
trend at Christmas to repeat everything later in the week) but people mention
Christmas in the past tense from Boxing Day onwards and this is wrong isn’t it?
Rather than asking if someone had a nice
Christmas, keep wishing him or her Merry Christmas until the 6th of
January. Maybe it’ll even help to get my festive spirit back.
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This week’s edition of The Sunday Alternative
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