Norman Rockwell Christmas
Christmas is over. The presents have all been unwrapped. Trays of snacks and leftovers fill every corner of our refrigerator. The stress of Christmas is matched only by the anticlimactic finish we feel when the day after Christmas comes. We chase the Christmas spirit like Ahab chased his white whale. The search for the perfect Christmas pushes us into stressful behavior that soon becomes post Christmas regret. Looking to this one day a year we wish that our lives might mirror a Norman Rockwell painting. Norman Rockwell painted pictures of idealized moments in life that we all dream of. Those paintings were snapshots of joys that do exist in the real world if only for a moment.
We spend so much time on the problems and pressures of the world that we rarely stop to notice that compassion and joy happens quietly around us. The amazing thing about Christmas is that it still works. We buy too much and eat too much. We put too much pressure on ourselves to express our love and appreciation to everyone we know and care for inside a wrapped box. Depression results far to often from all the expectation we put on Christmas. At the end of it, we buy more things for our children than they need. We eat food to the point of illness. Giving and receiving gifts that no one asked for fills the spaces under the living room evergreens of Christmas and eventually the backs of closets, destined for re-gifting next year. Still, with all its excess Christmas generates the kind of moments that are dreamt of all year round.
Christmas works because we believe for a moment in the hope of Norman Rockwell bliss. We believe that love can be expressed in the form of a foot massager. The smile of gratitude that we capture on Kodak and more often now, on digital pictures are our own Rockwell moments. In those few hours of Christmas morning we become givers of smiles and joy and all that is right with the world. When we look back on pictures from Christmas past we have great gaps in the narrative. The cameras are put away whenever arguments arise between family members. The flashbulbs are silent when the credit card bills are being paid. Our memories are as selective as our photo journalism. Christmas is a memory we carry without the baggage of the pressing issues of reality. This must be why we begin to anticipate this one day, one morning of a holiday as far back as Thanksgiving and beyond.
How much we must spend or what level of stress we must endure to produce these moments of Christmas bliss is always a topic of contention. How much does it cost to put the warm feeling of Christmas in our hearts throughout the rest of the year? Does it matter? The warm feeling of hope makes all of the excess of our traditions of Christmas burdens worth baring. I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and that we will all have recovered before the next one comes again next year.
We spend so much time on the problems and pressures of the world that we rarely stop to notice that compassion and joy happens quietly around us. The amazing thing about Christmas is that it still works. We buy too much and eat too much. We put too much pressure on ourselves to express our love and appreciation to everyone we know and care for inside a wrapped box. Depression results far to often from all the expectation we put on Christmas. At the end of it, we buy more things for our children than they need. We eat food to the point of illness. Giving and receiving gifts that no one asked for fills the spaces under the living room evergreens of Christmas and eventually the backs of closets, destined for re-gifting next year. Still, with all its excess Christmas generates the kind of moments that are dreamt of all year round.
Christmas works because we believe for a moment in the hope of Norman Rockwell bliss. We believe that love can be expressed in the form of a foot massager. The smile of gratitude that we capture on Kodak and more often now, on digital pictures are our own Rockwell moments. In those few hours of Christmas morning we become givers of smiles and joy and all that is right with the world. When we look back on pictures from Christmas past we have great gaps in the narrative. The cameras are put away whenever arguments arise between family members. The flashbulbs are silent when the credit card bills are being paid. Our memories are as selective as our photo journalism. Christmas is a memory we carry without the baggage of the pressing issues of reality. This must be why we begin to anticipate this one day, one morning of a holiday as far back as Thanksgiving and beyond.
How much we must spend or what level of stress we must endure to produce these moments of Christmas bliss is always a topic of contention. How much does it cost to put the warm feeling of Christmas in our hearts throughout the rest of the year? Does it matter? The warm feeling of hope makes all of the excess of our traditions of Christmas burdens worth baring. I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and that we will all have recovered before the next one comes again next year.
posted by kamuizot at 12:02 PM
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