Growing up in the past, the Christmas season (aka, The Holidays) started the day after Thanksgiving. At that given time, it was safe to put your Christmas tree up without people judging you. It was time to start the annual shopping sprees. You could turn on the radio and hear Christmas carols and holiday songs. The world turned red and green with a little bit of snow white. AND….that’s when Santa Claus arrived with great grandeur at the local mall.
Things have changed. A lot! Today is only November 15th, and its a whole 7 days prior to Thanksgiving. Guess where we will be tonight? At my youngest daughter’s choir performance. Call it what you want, but it is a Christmas show. The kids are wearing red or white t-shirts with traditional red and white Santa hats. They are singing traditional Christmas carols along with a few twists. There will be costume characters like Frosty the Snowman and good ole Saint Nick himself. Elsa and Anna will make an appearance because nothing says Christmas like characters from Frozen. Or maybe I should say nothing says winter like characters from a movie that sings about snow, cold, true love, and building a snowman. “Do you want to build a snowman?”
Maybe I haven’t mentioned it before, but we live in the heart of the South. The deep, deep South. I mean, we are so far south into Georgia that you can almost see the Florida border from the tallest building in town. Maybe not. Our tallest building only has two floors. My point is that we don’t experience winter like the rest of the country. We get rain and some cold temps. Once a generation we may get a little snow. The signal for winter or Christmas usually has nothing to do with building a snowman. The signal is all about Christmas shows, Black Friday shopping, and all the decorations going up in the big box stores. And those decorations were coming out way before the kids even went trick or treating the end of October. So we shouldn’t be surprised that choir rehearsal back in October was full of songs like “Silent Night” and “Jingle Bells” and “Let it Snow.” Snow…a type of precipitation most of these local kids never experienced until we got the rare snowfall this past January. (Global warming?)
It is November 15th, and I am really contemplating pulling out the Christmas tree this weekend. In my defense, we will be out of town all of Thanksgiving. If we don’t put it up now, it will be….well, it will still be November because Thanksgiving is so early this year. My next oldest daughter has her Christmas choir performance on November 29th. Yes, it is after Thanksgiving, but it feels weird saying Christmas and November in the same sentence. The Advent Calendar doesn’t even start until December 1st. If I pull the tree out now, we will have over 30 days of enjoying the Christmas lights and pretty ornaments. Just kidding….we are that family that keeps the tree up almost until Valentines Day. Putting the tree up early should be no big deal.
However, I read in an article this week that playing Christmas music too early in the year causes increased levels of stress. I don’t agree. Christmas music is fun and happy. Except for that “Grandma got ran over by a reindeer” song. That’s a bit dark of a thought during the holiday season. They even made a children’s movie based on that song about drunk Grandma and reckless driving Santa. Now that could be raising some anxiety for those partaking in eggnog and other holiday traditions. I hope the article is wrong because in order for my girls to practice for their choir shows we’ve had to listen to Christmas carols for several weeks now—both with and without music accompaniment.
We can blame the big box stores all we want. I didn’t list any by name because 99% of them are guilty of early Christmas supplies and decorations filling their aisles and end-caps. However, we are pushing the season further and further out ourselves with early Christmas pageants and other preparations. Don’t even get me started on Black Friday shopping on Thanksgiving Day. I worked in the retail business a few years, and I’ll just say our family had to celebrate Turkey Day on a Monday or Tuesday during that period of our lives. I’m not going to point fingers or judge though. Christmas is my favorite time of year. So let it grow! Let the music play. Turn everything red and green and sprinkle in some white. You have to admit the stores are so much more appealing with happy elves and adorable forest creatures adorning all the signs and decorations. And I am quite sure that baby Jesus doesn’t mind us extending his “birthday month” out to be more like his “birthday quarter of the year!” (Don’t get any ideas, Mary!)
Happy early Thanksgiving! And an early Merry Christmas for good measure!
