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Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas!



Yes, I say both.

Here's the thing- Hanukkah ended about a week ago.  Today's the winter solstice, which, if you're Wiccan or Pagan, is your thing.  Christmas will be followed by Boxing Day in Canada, the UK,  and most of the Commonwealth.  (It's a bullshit holiday supposedly derived from when servants were given presents from their employers.  Now, it's basically our Black Friday shopping bonanza). Then, the New Year is rung in.  So that's several holidays, and since I hope they're happy ones for everyone, I sometimes say Happy Holidays.  I live in a big, multicultural city, and I like to include everyone.  So sue me.

Happy Holidays does not mean "Go suck an egg, Christians!".  You do not lose your right to celebrate Christmas if someone greets you in an inclusive way.  I don't know why people get bent out of shape about the phrase Happy Holidays. It feels like looking for a reason to be pissed off, and why anyone chooses to approach life like that, I am sure I don't know. Some people spit back Merry Christmas as some sort of fuck you, which really does capture the spirit of the season, doesn't it?

Since Christmas is in a few days, yes, I will greet people with Merry Christmas! for the rest of the week.  I'm not remotely religious, but I still love Christmas.  To me, Christmas is about family, friends, kind gestures, charity, and overeating.  I love the traditions, the music and art: Handel's Messiah and The Nutcracker; Dickens' A Christmas Carol, and How the Grinch Stole Christmas.  I love hearing my mother recount, annually, how the first time I saw The Grinch on TV when I was about 3 years old, I FREAKED OUT when he stole Christmas and the show went to commercial.  She had to keep telling me "He brings it back!" and I didn't calm down until he did just that.

I love new traditions that have started with my friends, from reading David Sedaris' Dinah the Christmas Whore, to impromptu singing John Denver's all too real ode to the holiday Please Daddy Don't Get Drunk This Christmas.

I love the decorations.  Most of the year, I prefer a calming, not quite minimalist decor, but all that goes out the window on December 1.  That's when I bring out box after box of lights, candles, trinkets, tree decorations, and a stuffed Santa I have had for decades. I have a wreath on my front door made of jingle bells, for god's sake! Christmas is a time where less is not more, if you ask me.


My favourite movie for this season is Holiday Inn.  It's where the song White Christmas was first heard, and features the double whammy of Bing Crosby crooning and Fred Astaire dancing. (There is an unfortunate bit of blackface that you might want to fast-forward past, however).
As the title song says,
Happy holidays, happy holidays, while the merry bells keep ringing, may your every wish come true.
Happy holidays, happy holidays, may the calendar keep bringing happy holidays to you!




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