I don't like Christmas. It is true and I think, finally, I understand why.
As the days get shorter and shorter my mood gets darker and darker. It actually has a name, Seasonal Affective Disorder, or SAD. It is due to the lack of sunlight during the winter months. It even has treatments, but one first needs to recognize that treatment is need, which, finally, this year I have. The light box is on its way. In fact it is my Christmas present from my husband.
Now to understand how this relates to Christmas you need to remember that just days before the BIG day comes the longest night of the year. So each day, as everyone counts down to December 25, there is a little less sunlight in my life. Each day becomes a little more difficult to get through. While a shopper is out at mall celebrating the miracle of finding the perfect gift, I am home celebrating the miracle I got out of bed.
It is really hard to be "merry and bright" when the light, literally and figuratively, is leaving your life. It is hard to hear Christmas music when all the feelings associated with them is sadness. It is not that I don't rejoice in the reason for the season, I just don't have it within me to celebrate. So I have just learned to endure the month of December, putting up with all the well meaning comments from friends to get with the season and enjoy Christmas.
So please, let me be. Let me just endure the concerts, the hype, the parties. Don't expect me to find this time of the year to be "the most wonderful time of the year". Accept it. Come News Years Eve, with the light coming back, I will celebrate that the month is over, winter will end, and spring is on its way.
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Thanksgiving
I love to cook. The joy of having a large meal, of spending all day in the kitchen, is fun. But in the past my need for everything to be perfect has come between the joy of the journey and the end there of. Rolls timed in such a way that they come out of the oven just as we are ready to sit down. The table set with matching everything. The food done just right. You know, perfect.
To have a perfect dinner is stressful, plain and simple. There is just no way around it. It takes planing and effort and a whole lot of cooperation. In the past, if the meal was not going just right, then save any brave soul who would dare enter the kitchen. Up at the crack of dawn to get everything going so that it would done at exactly the time set, no exceptions.
Until today and a head cold.
I have a nasty cold that took off yesterday. The day set aside to clean the house. To bake 7 pies and 1 cheesecake. Plus the roll dough made, the red cabbage cooking, and the turkey breast brining. But when you feel lousy, all best laid plans get booted out. The roll dough got done. The turkey is brining. The red cabbage is cooked. The cheesecake got done. But the pies, nope did not happen. Even with all the help of the teenagers, it did not get done.
So this morning we made pies. I made the fillings, most of them before I went for a walk.JC made the pie crusts. D got the graham cracker crusts done. ND and AW rolled out dough and "made" a pie each. E did the topping for yet another. All the pie making ended about noon, and then I put the turkey in. So it wont be done at 2:00 this afternoon. The reality is no one is going anywhere for another 24 hours, so does it have to be done by 2:00??
As I mentally backed off from my need to have a "perfect" Thanksgiving I found I had a perfect morning with my children. Working with JC to get just the right crust was needed boost to him. Helping TH and AW crack eggs, and even letting them do it....it was a good thing. It was mommy time spent with children that are growing up just too fast. Teaching of skills that will last long after this day is done.
When all is said and done, I am having a perfect Thanksgiving. For what is this day but a celebration of what we are grateful for, and for me that is my family. A day with my family, filled with laughter and giggles. What could be more perfect?
To have a perfect dinner is stressful, plain and simple. There is just no way around it. It takes planing and effort and a whole lot of cooperation. In the past, if the meal was not going just right, then save any brave soul who would dare enter the kitchen. Up at the crack of dawn to get everything going so that it would done at exactly the time set, no exceptions.
Until today and a head cold.
I have a nasty cold that took off yesterday. The day set aside to clean the house. To bake 7 pies and 1 cheesecake. Plus the roll dough made, the red cabbage cooking, and the turkey breast brining. But when you feel lousy, all best laid plans get booted out. The roll dough got done. The turkey is brining. The red cabbage is cooked. The cheesecake got done. But the pies, nope did not happen. Even with all the help of the teenagers, it did not get done.
So this morning we made pies. I made the fillings, most of them before I went for a walk.JC made the pie crusts. D got the graham cracker crusts done. ND and AW rolled out dough and "made" a pie each. E did the topping for yet another. All the pie making ended about noon, and then I put the turkey in. So it wont be done at 2:00 this afternoon. The reality is no one is going anywhere for another 24 hours, so does it have to be done by 2:00??
As I mentally backed off from my need to have a "perfect" Thanksgiving I found I had a perfect morning with my children. Working with JC to get just the right crust was needed boost to him. Helping TH and AW crack eggs, and even letting them do it....it was a good thing. It was mommy time spent with children that are growing up just too fast. Teaching of skills that will last long after this day is done.
When all is said and done, I am having a perfect Thanksgiving. For what is this day but a celebration of what we are grateful for, and for me that is my family. A day with my family, filled with laughter and giggles. What could be more perfect?
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