Wednesday, December 14, 2011

Milk of human kindness


I had my Christmastime meltdown at our neighborhood Christmas party last weekend, so I can cross that off the list.  Very close friend who has five children: "So, expecting number five?"  Me:  "Ha ha.  NO.  A thousand times NO."

There's just so much stuff.  All. Month. Long.  Chirpy magazine article on relieving holiday stress: "Just say no!"  Oh sure, I'm going to be the pinehole who doesn't send canned goods for the food pantry to each of my three children's schools or not give each teacher a gift or not bring dairy-free cookies to every event or not send in each child's advent offering or not attend my husband's work-related events or not let my children be in the Christmas pageant or not send photos to each far away and/or old relative.  Thanks, Women's Magazine!  You just cleared it all up for me!  Where's the peppermint bark?

Maybe washing all of the curtains and slipcovers with my free water will put me in the Christmas spirit!  Or maybe I should just flood the backyard and make an ice rink.


7 comments:

  1. Well. I would vote ice rink, but I am sure that would create a whole host of other issues to deal with and it sounds like you are up to your eyeballs in issues.

    Christmas comes but once a year.

    Say it with me.

    Christmas comes but once a year.

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  2. Ice rink! In your neighbor's yard!

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  3. The "just say no" thing drives me up a tree, too. Just for starters, it condescendingly implies that the little woman has once again deliberately and out of silly social obligations bitten off more silly unnecessary things than she can chew, and now needs to be patted and told it's OKAY to do less. When the ACTUAL situation is that most of the stuff we do we REALLY DO need to do and have NOT really voluntarily gotten into.

    Sigh.

    I had my little meltdown yesterday evening, wondering why we even HAVE Christmas. I feel better now.

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  4. ICE RINK. You should totally do that.

    The just say no thing is weird. For example, I am just passive aggressively not responding to an email asking for - yet another - dish donation for the teacher appreciation potluck. I JUST SENT TWO DISHES TWO WEEKS AGO. But now I feel like an ass. I mean, I could just make something, couldn't I? But LAWDY I do not want to.

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  5. Oh YES on the "just say no" thing. I'll just jet off to Hawaii and let everyone else take care of the presents/stockings/cards/exchanges/parties. Silly ME, why didn't I think of that?

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  6. Really? I'm going to be the one mom who refuses to bring a culturally significant food to my kids class holiday party. Right. Just say no, my extra-fluffy-during-the-holidays ass.

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  7. I'd like to just say no. I'd like to say NO, crawl into bed and not get out until the groundhog sees his shadow. If I say no, then nothing gets done and my family is very sad. Now there's a Merry Christmas for ya.

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