Home For The Holidays (I stab-stab that song)

[plumtreeblossom]

I wish I could stop stressing about the coming snowstorm and my travel on Thursday. But then, there's ample reason to stress. There will be a snowstorm, and I will be traveling in it. Sure it's Amtrak, which is probably the form of transportation least affected by winter weather, but delays do happen. And it's a 2-legged connecting journey, with the small but present risk of getting stranded overnight in Albany. I'll just to have to suck it up and deal.

If I were Queen of the world, I would change two things about Christmas:

Reduce emphasis on gifting
Reduce emphasis on obligatory holiday travel

I'd keep all the music and beauty and food and merry parties and sparkling lights, but the gifting and travel would be right out. Not banned, but not forced upon our culture to such a degree that they become two of the worst stress-creators of the season. Nobody is expected to travel great distances to be with their families for Halloween. We simply enjoy it wherever we are. Christmas (and Thanksgiving, for that matter) could have the same low impact, if more people were allowed to feel comfortable visiting loved ones at other times of the year, and not having to cram with the teeming masses into overcrowded airports, losing their luggage, getting stranded, car breaking down, and all manner of hell in the name of a holiday. Will we ever reach a point where enough people have spent Christmas sleeping on airport floors that we can stop this nonsense? How many people have to die on congested, icy roads before we finally wise up?

In the above, by we I mean me. I'm following the lemmings, as I must every year. In a tiny family of only 4 people, anyone not there causes an OMFG FLIPOUT CATASTROPHY. It wouldn't matter if a category 5 hurricane was laying biblical waste to all things between Boston and Rochester. I would be expected to get there even if I had to para sail on a freezing gale of wind. If not, Emily would be put on the phone to sob and wail dramatically (which really happened once when I had missed my flight and no more were available until after Christmas. Thus was born my Amtrak tradition).

I hope everyone who's staying put, wherever you are, has a really wonderful Christmas or Winter Holiday of your choice, and I hope I do, too. I just wish it were simpler.

Comments

[dpolicar]

If I were Queen of the World, I would get all emotionally blackmailing family members into therapy and leave Christmas alone.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I do it for my mother. She's 73 and in poor health, and I'm not going to have her forever. After she's gone, I'm done. Christmas will be at my place, all are welcome to come or not.

[chienne-folle.livejournal.com]

Your mom sounds like a good reason for you to WANT to go. But blackmailing you into going is bad form from your relatives, and giving into emotional blackmail makes you feel bad. Can you focus on the reasons why you want to go, so that you'll feel like you're choosing to go, rather than being forced? Or can you stay at home for Christmas and visit your mother more often during the good-weather months?

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I go for my mother, because the holiday isn't very pleasant for her without me. When we were children, she made our Christmases truly spectacular. They were like dream Christmases. For all her work in making the childhood holiday wonderful for us, I go, because she can't do very much anymore.

The hassles of travel aside, it's easier now that I don't have to spend any time with my brother's putrid wife (long story, but they don't live together yet still have a husband-wife relationship. She isn't Emily's mother; that's someone else.). I flatly refused, and she stays away when I'm there. This is all to the good.

I'm nervous because I've been having some very non-positive feelings towards my niece. There's been more news about further foul behavior (I don't really want to go into it, because it makes me ill). I don't know if I'm going to be entirely comfortable around her this year. I'm going to try, though.

[vanguardcdk.livejournal.com]

At least you're traveling on Amtrak: not only do you have a much easier ride with the snow (hopefully) but also since it starts in Boston you should get a pretty nice choice of seats.

As far as Christmas travelling..well, you'll have to change the dynamic of families for that. Sorry hon.
I get out of it by making Thanksgiving my big "see the family" holiday. I made it quite clear when I moved out here that would be the case.

[weegoddess.livejournal.com]

Reduce emphasis on gifting
Reduce emphasis on obligatory holiday travel

You ARE Queen of the World, honey. You are Queen of YOUR world. I can understand your wanting to honour your mom while she's around, and that's a decision you make. You can also decide not to. Obviously, there would be repercussions and it's up to you to figure out which scenario you prefer. In other words, suck it up, honey. (FWIW, I've lived in a guilt-inducing manipulating family too and know your pain.)

For awhile, my mom and sister and I were doing 'wishlists' whereby we would give each other lists of gift ideas. We knew that we were getting something that the recipient wanted, since it was on the list. But since there were many items on a list, there was an element of surprise in that we didn't know which item(s) we'd be getting. It worked well for awhile. Now we don't do gifts at all and it's so much better.

I hear you!

[heatherp8.livejournal.com]

I heard a co-worker moaning about the exact same thing today.
Her parents live very far away and usually the closest sibling goes to spend the holiday with them.
This year, however, that sibling is off on a holiday of her own so the parents will be *GASP!* alone for Christmas.
Of course, the maternal unit had to call and put a guilt trip on my co-worker, hinting very broadly that perhaps she could find a way to take her sister's place.
Sorry, my coworker replied, no can do.
Trust me, it's a situation as old as time, kiddo.
I've been there a few times myself - trying to decide which family "gets us" for Christmas Eve and which family "gets us" for Christmas dinner.
It's exhausting!
But this year, I made it perfectly plain to my spouse that we're spending the holiday right here in our very own little nest. After all, it's our first Christmas in our new home. Where else would we be?
But I feel for your dilemma, my dear.

[http://users.livejournal.com/urban_faerie_/]

I TOTALLY AGREE WITH YOUR HOLIDAY PHILOSOPHY!!!

That's part of the reason i invited my family to my place this year...

[msjann65.livejournal.com]

I agree with you, too. When I was still married and the kids were young, I told family that they were most welcome to come for Christmas dinner, that I just could not make the kids go somewhere else -- after all it was Christmas and the kids had their toys to play with, and I was cooking a dinner anyway, and besides what if we all got snowed in? So early on there was no question as to whose relatives we would visit on Christmas. Usually about a week or so before Christmas I would have a Sunday buffet and invite all the relatives on both sides for a luncheon and gift exchange. No matter how we cut it, it was always a hassle. Now? My Mom is 91, and I go see her every week weather permitting. I have been snowed and iced out this last couple of weeks, and I am not planning on spending Christmas with her at my sister's house, either. If it turns out that Christmas day is nice enough so that there is no ice on Sue's outside staircase, then I will probably go over for a visit for an hour or two - after dinner here. Gifting is also a hassle - limited funds, limited mobility, bad weather, etc. Ma says that now after all these years Xmas is just another day for her and that I should stay home and not take the chance of falling down and undoing all the good my physical therapist has done. Still, it's not easy. I don't have anyone putting guilt on me -- I put it on myself.

[spacechicken.livejournal.com]

May you not be stuck in Albany. As a native I can state from experience that that place sucks double plus bad in the wintertime.

I completely agree with your holiday philosophy. Christmas is becoming a time that I associate with rampant consumerism and high stress.

[surrealestate.livejournal.com]

Yes, that.

[strangeanimal.livejournal.com]

Roxanne and I used to do a quasi-Christmas, travelling on MLK weekend, precisely to avoid the Christmas travel lunacy. As far as being "together" with the fam on the holidays, that's why telephones were invented!

[docorion.livejournal.com]

I lucked out. For my college years, I really wanted to go home for Christmas. Because 'home' was in Holland, and 'going home' meant a trip to Europe, all expenses paid by Mom and Dad, thanks! After that, I really didn't need presents, because hey, free trip to Europe!

When my folks moved to Houston, I was not going there. I made it exceedingly clear I wasn't going there, and I never have, at least not specifically for Christmas. I have gone once for my sister's wedding, and once when I was traveling through on my Motorcycle Roadtrip Extravaganza, and it was on the way to where I was going anyway. Other than that, not so much. Oh, and once with my then-spouse; don't recall why, but we did.

My folks are nice people. They are especially nice if I don't see them often.

[oneagain.livejournal.com]

I deleted the last comment almost immediately after I wrote it because I think I made the mistake of mentioning something from a locked entry--my apologies. I was commiserating with you; I don't know if it helped, but that was the intent.