Christmas

11 Comments

Christmas. I could care less, which seems to put me in a distinct minority. A lot of people proclaim not to like Christmas, but in the same breath admit that they couldn’t resist buying loads of crap that nobody really needed—as if they had no control.

We didn’t do one thing for Christmas here. And even I am not immune to feeling pangs of guilt over it from time to time. But then I remind myself that:

  • My kids don’t know anything about Christmas.
  • Ali and I, and our kids until they are old enough to choose for themselves, are atheists. Celebrating the birth of Jesus is pretty hypocritical (not that anybody is really doing that anyway).
  • My children are not in NEED of anything. Hell, they’re not even in WANT of anything.
  • That buying things because marketers tell us to is also pretty hypocritical to our lifestyle in general. And the list goes on. But that’s the gist of it. Ali and I just feel no compunction over our Scrooginess regarding the holiday.

Ali informed me via e-mail last night that we were going to a big cruiser’s dinner at the cruiser’s restaurant with some friends tonight. Yeah, via e-mail. I replied, “You realize this will probably be the most cruiser-ish thing we’ve ever done right?” But hey, we like our friends and we like their daughter, so if we’re going to go and be all cruiser-ish it may as well be with them.

And we had a great time. We met a lot of Bum friends that we didn’t know we had, talked with some old friends, and there were a couple more kids around too. The music was good, the food was plentiful, and then…

The local children began lining up on the sidewalk and suddenly that whole feeling of Norte Americano superiority invaded. The whole point of this dinner was to distribute some 700 gifts to the children of La Cruz. Admirable in its own way I guess. But when it goes against my families own feelings toward the holiday, and pushes Christmas and all that that entails, it just didn’t feel good to me.

I mean what is the point really? Seven hundred crappy plastic $20 Chinese toys that will be busted up garbage inside of a month. Did it bring smiles and squeals of delight to the kids? Of course it did. There’s no such thing as a kid who doesn’t get excited when given a present. Even when the present comes from the rich gringos that live behind the locked fences on those big boats at the edge of town.

Anyway, who am I to judge? I pretty much bankrupted my giving parents back when I was just a wee-one and my dad was still just struggling to find his way to the second rung of the business ladder. Besides, my kids are one and three, we’ll see how well my no-Christmas b.s. is holding up when they are seven and nine.

All right, seriously, I’m going to stop talking about Christmas now. At least until Macy’s starts playing Jingle Bells again on October 1st, 2013.

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Okay, one more thing. Lowe was at this party playing with his Matchbox ambulance. His 1981 Matchbox ambulance, that is. His Uncle JJ’s 1981 Matchbox ambulance. He carried it outside with him, and came back empty handed—ambulance nowhere to be found. Out on a call perhaps.

The kid who is pushing that around tonight will be getting coal in his stocking next year. That’s all.

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11 Comments on “Christmas”

  1. Ok Grinchy McScrooge, here is how to get behind the whole Christmas thing as an atheist (in my husband’s case) or as a maybeist (me). The whole Jesus birth thing is an awesome story for kids. It proves that no matter how humble your birth- even if you are born to a homeless, unwed teenage mom with a really suspect cover story, you can change the world and rise to greatness.

    Your window for the kids to believe in magic is very small.Belief in someone who has a flying sleigh and flies around spreading joy for no other reason than he likes to make people happy is a good thing. When they are older, they might chose to look at it as my older girl does. Santa is the spirit of fun and giving and we all get to play a role in creating that bit of fun for the littles and it is awesome to create a bit of fantasy for no other reason than to spread a little joy. We all should try to spread a little more happy and joy because these are good things.

    Giving into commercialism is a choice. Our kids do get presents, but very, very modest ones and no more than 3. Kitty is pretty darned stoked to have received some paint and paper. Maura is excited about her book. It doesn’t have to be about getting some sweet schwag. It can just be about having an excuse to be exited, happy and to have something to look forward to in winter.

    Your friend,
    Little Cidnie Loo Who 😉

  2. Okay, now I know why I truly follow you ( besides you having a gorgeous family, beautiful photos and living my dream of taking off on a sailboat and leaving all this crap I deal with…….crappy weather included, behind).
    You may be in the minority but you do have some company there.
    I completely agree with EVERYTHING you just said.
    I do give my kids stockings, but they are filled with socks, underwear, lip balm, shampoo, nuts, chocolates, dried fruit and an orange to fill out the toe, and this year I included some of those really cool metal brain teaser puzzles where you have to figure out how to pull apart the seemingly permanently entangled components ( when they figure it out, my sister’s kids will inherit them). Almost everything is necessary and consumable.
    I’m a zero- waste, practical person and the handing out of plastic-destined-for-the-landfill crap makes me sick, too.
    Keep being who you are.
    I don’t have to tell you that your children will not miss what they don’t know, especially when they’re not getting their information from marketers.
    I am the proud mama to a 17 year old who doesn’t ask for a thing ( which makes it really difficult to buy him anything, even an upgraded laptop!) and a 10 year old who’s a little more susceptible ( but we’re working on it).
    All the best to you and your family,
    Maya

  3. Good perspective Cid! We are atheists too, and we just like making December one big party. Lots of popcorn and candles and chocolate (for the big kid) and music and movies. We have traditions like shadow puppet shows and certain stories and books and fancy cocoa and making decorations and paper snowflakes. We talk with the kids about the nights getting longer and how over the years people all over the world have made up stories to bring themselves comfort during the long darkness.
    This year we recycled and wrapped Zach’s old toddler toys and gave them to Naia. She opened one and was done, so happy! So we put them back in the closet for the next occasion. This is why I started getting crafty when I became a parent. I didn’t want to buy plastic crap. I wanted to find a different way. So we make some, or trade with people who are better at making things than us, and recycle, and so on.
    So I guess what I am saying, it doesn’t have to be commercial or nothing. Or god or nothing. Make up your own reasons to have some fun.

  4. Pat, Ali
    I grew up celebrating Christmas until I was 9, then I didnt after that. I never missed it. The reasons behind having stopped are a whole big subject, not something I am going to get into here.. but the long and short is, I had it and then went without. and turned out FINE. and have nEVER resented NOT having christmas. I remember when we did have it.. it was so competative… ” I GOT THIS ” and my broke ass parents trying to buy good gifts, fighting more during the holidays, the stress…. I honestly dont miss it. I have absolutely no reason to abstain from Christmas at this point except the exact same reasons as you. I dont have any beliefs about Christ, God, etc.. that would make me anything but a hypocrite to participate in it, and on and on, just like you mentioned. The only thing that I got for ANYONE was a present that I was going to get anyway for my awesome boss, and an expensive bottle of Tequila for my dad, on our trip to the Alvord Desert Hot Springs.. 🙂 anyway, to wrap it up, I went without christmas and am FIIIIINE
    For the record, I think you guys are GREAT parents. that comes from not just following your blog, but having met you and spent actual time with you. You guys have a lot figured out.
    Will

  5. Right on, with the exception of my mother in laws Swedish smorgasbord on christmas eve I could totally skip it.

  6. Well said. Although agreeing with all that as we begin carefully wrapping “precious” ornaments for the next 11 months probably makes me a hypocrite. I’m just DONE with consumerism, but caught on the treadmill at the same time (my better half doesn’t share the dream of a simple life of self-determination and self-reliance). A local charity here on Cape Cod has an annual “Stuff-a-Bus” drive in which they try to collect as many toys as possible to give away to children in the area. I think they filled over 25 school buses this year. And while I applaud the sentiment, I was thinking – in the grand scheme of things/life – what meaningless gesture. So very empty.

  7. Hell, I’m not even saying we’re good at being non-consumers ourselves. We’ve got more plastic toys on this boat than I would like to admit. Though we do manage to keep it to one cabinet about three feet wide by two feet deep (not bad for two kids if I say so myself). I guess we just don’t appreciate being told what to do—i.e. buy stuff and give it to people who could probably just as easily buy it themselves if they really needed it. Kind of the way we are with everything in life I guess. “You can’t go sailing! You’ve never sailed a day in your life.”

    @Rich, wrapping “precious” ornaments. That cracks me up. Only because we’ve got a plastic storage box in Ali’s parents basement filled with ornaments that my mom bought for both Ali and I for years and years. We put up a tree once in our adult lives together, and even that came down after one weekend because we decided to move. 🙂

    1. Well you guys probably have figured out that I am not going to be remembered for my religiosity! I have over the years been known to have a lot of fun with my kids on “Christmas” morning. While I don’t like the concept of showering them with a bunch of crap, I don’t like the idea that our family could be screwed out of a little party atmoshere either. I don’t give a rats rear what anyone else is celebrating, hanging up a stocking, a nicer than usual meal, a few well chosen gifts always seemed like fun to me. One tradition is the big box. I would hunt around for a large appliance box, furnish it some markers, a little tap light, some poster paper and let the kids supply the imagination. The gifts turned out to be forgetable, the fairy castles, batcaves, pirate ships, and dozens of other box worlds are often remembered.
      If folks want to hang up lights, have some extra days off, and make merry, what the hay! Pass the damned eggnog!

      Love
      Magic

  8. Hi you guys!

    Couple of things I felt moved to chime in on:

    RE: Rudder Post Blues
    A few months ago, my significantly other, Chris, exuberantly took his 24-foot 1968 Columbia (sailboat ;-> ) out for a few trial runs, having laboriously restored and replaced the working parts that had gone the way of all stuff parked in backyards for 15 years in Florida.

    The sail went well; the main had somehow managed to survive in good shape, and Chris had overcome his natural queasiness to raise an extremely dirty sail (works fine, even if it isn’t pristine white, as it turns out).

    Unfortunately, he had neglected to take advantage of ‘local knowledge’ (the marina owners, other sailors in the marina). Also, there was a crucial marker missing on the weirdly serpentine channel going out and returning to the marina. In the event, he tried to return to the marina keeping red-right-returning, but fetched up on a vicious rock ledge within 10 feet of the entrance, learning the hard way that there is an actual physical feature that gives the city of Rockledge its name.

    The impact sheared the rudder post off at the hull. We have pictures–and we still have our sailboat, the Eumelia. Somehow the rock ledge missed its main target, and instead of scuttling the laboriously restored old boat, cleanly sheared off the keel-mounted rudder.

  9. RE: The Rudder Post Blues (continuing)

    I am sure you know how he felt, so there’s no need to go into that. After taking about a week and a half to retrieve his will to go on living, not to mention restoring the Eumelia, his vivid imagination teamed up with his remarkably copious mechanical intuition to come up with a better rudder. He told us he preferred a stern-mounted rudder, anyway, so the whole ordeal had been a blessing in disguise.

    So he got to work building a new rudder. That’s right, he drew it, mocked it up, tried it out (with a very vivid remodeled mental image of the weirdly serpentine channel), and made a new one, all cross-laid and glassed up, on the front porch of his 36-foot mobile home at the Riverview Mobile Home Park for oldies-but-goodies.

    Here’s the real pay-off: the Eumelia now sails closer to the wind and more responsive to the tiller than that dumb old keel-mounted piece of Indian River Lagoon junk at the base of that stupid rock ledge. So there!

    PS Don’t expect pictures of the Eumelia under sail until we save up for a new pristine white one!

    Will be using a separate page to post in agreement with your family’s choices about Christmas – will include pictures of the manatees wintering at Blue Spring, where we opted out of the Ho-Ho-Ho without being snookered by a bunch of do-gooders stuffing a bus with plush animals or handing out Chinese plastic toys. So call me Scrooge; what you think of me is none of my business ;->

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