Doing Christmas Right

Every year at this time, I see a lot of debate about the correct way to do the holiday season.  Since I do Christmas, that's the one I have the most knowledge and experience with, but I believe a lot of these thoughts can apply to any holiday, at any time of the year.

When does the tree/decor go up?  In my little world, this is after Thanksgiving.  That weekend is full of activities with the larger family and in the spaces between them, my apartment gets decorated.  I don't get upset at others for decorating earlier or later because they aren't hurting anyone. (I do think they're silly, but silly is harmless fun.) They have their reasons, and it's none of my beeswax. 

When does the tree/decor come down?  One of my sisters is Catholic and her decor stays up until Epiphany - also known as Twelfth Night or The Twelfth Day of Christmas.  Her son takes his tree down (quite methodically, I might add) on the evening of the day itself.  The rest of the extended family does it at their leisure, me included.  My decor does stay up until after the new year begins, but beyond that, who knows? 

How much decor to use?  Some are minimalist.  Others have front lawns that rival professional displays.  Some do strict themes and others just embrace utter chaos.  Again, it's a matter of taste.  Again, it's harmless fun.  Don't stress out over what other people do.  Just have a giggle if you think they're silly, let them have a giggle at you, and move along.

What is the proper procedure for opening the gifts?  This one is a bit trickier, since so many of us do gift exchanges in the homes of others.  It boils down to one question:  Who owns/rents the home you are in?  THAT PERSON SETS THE RULES.  If in your home the proper method is utter chaos, fine.  If the gifts have to be opened alphabetically by height, fine.  But if you are at Uncle Bob's, you follow Uncle Bob's rules.  This is the exception to the taste/fun/beeswax rule. 

For my sister, Christmas is a holy day.  For me, it's a wonderful way to love and be loved.  What works for me may not work for her.  We spend the day together.  We compromise.  Because in the end, it's each other that matters.  That is doing Christmas right.

Baby It's Cold Outside

People are calling for a ban of a classic song based on their own personal interpretation of the lyrics. 

"Baby, It's Cold Outside" is basically a conversation between a man and a woman, one in which she thinks she should go home and he wants her to stay.  While some of the lines can be problematic ("what's in this drink") it really does boil down to our own interpretation. 

Can it be seen as him sexually harassing her and possibly setting her up for date rape?  Yes.  Can it be seen as both of them wanting more time together and her being concerned about gossip?  Yes.  It's all a matter of interpretation, and if we see something problematic in it, why not use it as a teaching moment? 

My sister loathes "Santa Baby" because of the singer's obvious greed.  Others say it sexualizes Santa because the singer is using her feminine wiles on him.  (Santa's not allowed to be sexual?  Poor Mrs. Claus)  These people have, for decades, simply turned the station.

I hate "Blue Christmas" because, to me, it's a guilt trip.  You go on and have fun - I'll sit in the corner and eat wet cigarette butts. If you hear nothing more than "I miss you", that's fine.  That's probably the actual intent of the song.  But what I hear is what I hear. So I just turn the station.

Does "Rudolph The Red-Nose Reindeer" imply bullying is okay?  Does "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" support the Patriot Act?  "12 Days of Christmas" has human beings as gifts - slavery, anyone?  Should anything be banned because of what you or I read into it? 

It's not like any of these songs are coming right out and saying these things.  We're reading into them, as human beings do, and even if they did...  this is called a teaching moment. 

Appropriation or Appreciation?

We hear so much about Cultural Appropriation like it's a bad thing.  Appropriate can mean steal or usurp, but it can also mean borrow or adopt.  Borrowing and adopting come from appreciation.  The Great American Melting Pot is and was all about appropriation - we borrow ideas from one another. The whites came here from Europe and took some ideas from the folks that already lived here.  Those folks took some ideas from the Europeans.  Corn for metal tools, maybe, or booze for tobacco. Italian immigrants traded recipes with their German neighbors.  

My own lineage is mostly German and Irish.  I have a friend who is Sioux.  Are we not allowed to celebrate Christmas because it's largely based on Mediterranean traditions?  Of course we can - we appropriated it because we appreciated it.  The Mother Earth/Father Sky motif reflects my beliefs much more accurately than anything else.  Ethnic foods are just plain yummy.  I am not victimizing anyone by braiding my hair.  No one is being hurt because my names are (in order of appearance) Latin, French, and German.  

That's not to say it's never a problem.  Plagiarism is a form of appropriation and the only people that approve of it are the plagiarists.  Eminent Domain is appropriation, but every time a government uses it, there is an outcry.  But it's hardly the problem it's made out to be.

A white dude that wears dreadlocks is not appropriating black culture.  Many European cultures (and some native to the Americas) wore similar styles or maybe he just appreciates the look.  There are legitimate reasons why a non-Asian might wear a kimono.  

Most Americans, regardless of race or religion, start the day with a cup of coffee.  Coffee was invented by Arabs and adopted by Europeans.  Sometimes they have grits, made from corn and borrowed from the natives of North America, for breakfast.  If they eat spaghetti or pizza, they're appreciating Italian food.  Maybe they have popcorn in the evening (see previous mentions of corn) for a snack.  

Think for a moment of all the things you enjoy that came from a different place than your DNA. Those things were all appropriated, borrowed, adopted...  because they were appreciated.  Some of the things others enjoy were benignly filched from your ancestors.  And that's okay.  No harm, no foul.  Usually.  

War on Christmas and Muslim Terrorists

The "War on Christmas" is not even about religion.   It's about economics.  Retailers woke up to the reality that other religions exist and decided not to lose business by ignoring those people. For decades, maybe centuries even, the only places that even acknowledged Jewish holidays were those with a large Jewish population. Any faith not of the Judeo-Christian tradition was ignored completely. The use of "Happy Holidays" and non-specific decor is not meant to exclude anyone, but to stop that very thing.

And on another note, there are 1.57 billion Muslims in the world. To assume every one of them is a terrorist is stupid.  If they were all terrorists, anyone who is not Muslim would be dead a long time ago.  Yes, we hear a lot about the Taliban and Al Queda and ISIS.  We also hear a lot about the Westboro Baptist Church and the KKK.  We don't hear about the vast majority of any religious group because they are boring. They go to work and mind their business.

How about we all just stop focusing on the differences?  Most of us just want to wake up in the morning and get back to bed that night without tragedy happening in the interim.  We want to worship as we see fit, and we are willing to let others do the same.  We want to feel Whatever-Mart is not ashamed we shop there.

There is no war on Christmas.  Muslim is not a synonym for terrorist.  

Holidays and Holy Days

It happens every year.  Twice a year, to be exact.  The first time is in and around December and the second is during Spring.  The Christians allow the media to get them all fired up about The War On Christmas and then, to a lesser degree, The War On Easter.  Godless Heathens everywhere are out to get these holiest of days.

What the Christians don't realize and the media isn't telling them is simple.  These Holiest of Days belonged to the Heathens first, but not Godless ones.  These Heathens had their own Gods and the early Christian Church, in an effort to usurp those Gods, adopted the ceremonial occasions.  Long before it was the birthday of Jesus, December 25 was Saturnalia.  Most of the trappings of Christmas come from various traditions connected to pagan worship.

The same goes for Easter - the name of which is actually derived from the name of a Heathen Goddess.  The bunny, the eggs... guess what Gods they honored originally?

I take no issue with any faith's Holy Days.  I even celebrate a Secular Christmas and I embrace Easter as a celebration of Spring.  The Holy Days of another faith do us no harm.  The Media's upsetting people just to get ratings, however, harms all of us because it creates problems.

Then we have the Holy Days that have been completely usurped by society in general.  Any Catholic will tell you any saint's day is holy.  Not as holy as Jesus's days, but holy nonetheless.  Yet two of the saint's days have come quite... well, unholy is too strong a word, but hear me out.

St Valentine and St Patrick were great men of amazing faith.  Yet most people don't even call February 14 St Valentine's Day.  It's Valentine's Day.  As in be my.  (Actually, many folks think it is Valentimes Day.  I even knew someone named Valentine who did that.)  No one pauses to think about the martyr to his cause because they are too busy doing things that, quite frankly, he would probably have disapproved of.

And poor ole St Patrick.  If people know anything about him, it's simply that he is the patron saint of Ireland.  Maybe they know he ran all the snakes out of Ireland, and that he used the shamrock to teach Trinity Doctrine.  What does this martyr get?  Everyone celebrates the Irish heritage they may or may not have by indulging in, again, behavior the day's namesake frowned upon. Even today, in the society that rails against stereotyping and in which the names of sports teams create heated arguments, the Irish are drunken brawling leprechauns.

The same folks who think I'm out to get Jesus because I say "Season's Greetings" are dressing up like lawn ornaments and getting drunk on green beer.  Most of them aren't even still fornicating with this years "Valentime".  The same media that's got folks screaming down the street about the War On My Religion is not telling them they are doing the same thing, possibly even to themselves.  But I don't blame the media - they're just doing their job.  I blame the ones screaming down the street.

Defining Family

Several years ago, I was introduced to the world of genaeology by a distant cousin and then a co-worker.  I got a computer program for the information and hit on the brilliant idea of giving each of my siblings a copy of the family tree for Christmas!  All I had to do was enter our spouses, children, and grandchildren.  The paper and ink would be expensive, but the sentiment was worth it.  Then I posed myself the question "Who do I include?"

I have seven siblings, two parents, and a total of three step-parents.  The siblings each have at least one spouse and at least one child.  Some of them have ex-stepchildren that they still think of as their own. Feelings were going to be hurt even if  I figured out a  Definition of Family.  What I finally decided was if they had a legal or biological link to us, they were going into the family tree.  What I gave my siblings that Christmas was prefaced by a little speech (or a letter if it was mailed) explaining my Definition of Family for this purpose.  No, some "family members" were not there.  Others, like the the childless second wife of a brother, were at the very least mentioned in notes. 

My Definition has created some funny (both peculiar and ha-ha) branches.  My oldest brother has been married three times.  When he married wife #1, she already had a daughter.  After they divorced, she had another child in her next relationship.  My brother's third wife came with a son, who he legally adopted.  Then they adopted an unplanned baby from Wife #1!  Who needs soap operas?!  

Another brother married a woman with a daughter and had two sons with her.  They divorced, he remarried (this wife came with four kids), and the first wife later had another son.  One of my sisters legally adopted her own grandchild.  This is why I love the NOTES section!  


So, if my math is correct, I have two ex-step-nieces, one ex-step-niece's half brother, seven step-nephews and step-nieces, a biological great-niece who is legally my niece, one who is half brother to an ex-step-niece and two "real" nephews, AND twelve "real" nephew/nieces.  I just call them my minions.

And then there are my grand-minions....   You may feel free to run away screaming.