Bah Fuckn HumBug
‘Twas the night before Christmas and I gave no fucks
About holidays and family and all those Santa schmucks.
-Tee Franklin
I hate the holidays; always have. I never celebrated Christmas as a child. “Christ wasn’t born on December 25th.” I heard it every year from my mother if I even thought about bringing up the word Christmas. I couldn’t even go to anyone’s house that celebrated Christmas, because my mother didn’t want me to be exposed to that “paganism”. Presents weren’t happening either and no one could give me them. If there was a present, I wasn’t getting it on that day.
I always said, when I get older and have kids, we’re going to have so many traditions and celebrate Christmas; I kept my word. 2000 was the first year I got a Christmas tree, I didn’t know how to decorate it and it ended up being the gaudiest tree of them all. I spoiled my children with mountains of gifts, even spoiled my then husband. I did it up. Cooking dinner and baking for my goof troop. I. Loved. It.
Well, at least I thought I did.
Inside, there was no joyful spirit. I hated Christmas. I hated Thanksgiving. These holidays are family centered, yet…my family treated me like shit. I couldn’t get past that. I put on the phoniest of phony smiles and attitudes to make sure that my children received what I didn’t have – they didn’t know the difference, but I did.
I was envious of my ex-husband’s family, (even tho I can’t stand those fucking fucks) Thanksgiving and Christmas was filled to the brim with cousins, aunts, uncles twice removed, etc. My side of the family? Nothing.
Hate is such a strong word, but I hate a good portion of people in my family. Without getting into specifics a lot of my physical, mental, emotional, and sexual trauma stems from my family. How could I in good conscious sit with family members that did unspeakable things to me? It made me sick and as a kid, I really didn’t know what was going on, but I knew shit was WRONG.
So with my 3 children, I did something different for them and “loved” the holidays. It didn’t last long. When the separation from my abusive husband happened, there went the holiday tradition. I tried to keep it going, but it was just us. Thanksgiving was another day ending in Y and the kids would be with his family and I would be home, alone. Christmas turned into opening their presents with me and by the afternoon, they’d be with him. Again, I’d be home…alone.
When you’re home alone you start to reflect on things and it’s never a good thing. Back then I’d turn to alcohol and be a stay-at-home drunk until the 27th when the kids came home. Now, with the kids in their teenage years, they’d rather be at the “fun parent’s house” aka “the parent that will let me do whatever I want to do because they feel guilty for not being there for me as a child and tries to make it up on the holiday and I don’t have to do any chores and follow the rules”. (Yes, read that as one huge as run-on sentence.)
So here I am on Christmas Eve 2016, doing not a fucking thing and hating the holidays. Tomorrow, I’ll do some TV show marathon, order Chinese food, sleep, tweet and start my next writing gig.
A Merry Fucking Christmas indeed.