’Tis the Season – (PowerHouseCreatives Contest)

’Tis the Season

The holiday season that begins with Thanksgiving, climaxes with Christmas and then quickly fades into Valentine’s Day commercialism once we’ve ushered in the New Year - is now upon us. Some people are quite happy at this time of year, while others are quite sad and even depressed at this time of year.

Different people have different reasons for why this season makes them happier or sadder than they usually are. Some of them are only depressed during the holidays while they’re fine at all other times. It’s a rougher time than normal for many, and some choose to exit life during this season after losing all hope.

It’s the time when many of us eat way too much, and not just food that’s great, but also food that’s very high in calories. Since it’s the holiday season though, lots of us dig right in because it’s totally acceptable to gorge at holiday parties. ‘Tis the season you know!

And anyway, a New Year’s resolution will take care of fixing any and all damage we’ve done to ourselves during the holiday season. We all know how that works; once the holiday season ends, we’ll be back hitting the gym and before long, voila! We’re in fantastic shape again!

But while the holidays treat many of us to the most pleasurable parties and get-togethers of the year with friends, others are “treated” to even deeper levels of depression than normal, completely due to effects of the holiday season.

One of the first things that I recognized about life as a child was the wonder of Christmas. I couldn’t get over what a great deal it was to get presents once a year from a supernatural, all-seeing fat guy in a red suit that was constantly watching us, to see if we “were bad or good.”

He was second only to God as far as power goes, but he was way more fun because he brought us presents, as long as we checked out okay and we weren’t on his “naughty” list! I wonder how the serial killers we’ve had viewed this. Do you think they as kids hated Santa, and actually tried to get on the naughty list?

I think it’s logical to think serial killers would be exactly like this. It’s possible that their evil nature makes them hate the season because of all the good vibes, cheerful songs, (there’s usually a little more love floating around in the air too), and more people recognizing and wanting to help the less fortunate among us.

I was fully immersed in the Christmas narrative featuring the fat man in the red suit, and then the next Christmas would occupy a fair amount of my thought processes throughout the coming year. I based my entire existence on Christmas being the big day, and once it was over it was time to start thinking about the next Christmas.

It wasn’t a healthy way to look at life even though I was just nine years old.

I found that the hoax of being told about Santa Claus at a very young age, as though he was a real person, was devastating to me when the time came to reveal it was all BS. I had a difficult time with it; I was even sure I had actually seen him in our house one Christmas eve when I awakened in the middle of the night.

Nine years old is probably pretty old for a child to still believe in Santa Claus these days, but back then it wasn’t that odd. None of my friends at school knew Santa was a farce yet either. In my case, it was my two years older sister that told me. She said it with such glee, I didn’t believe her, but it was soon confirmed.

I never thought that much about thanksgiving back then; I just knew there would be pumpkin pie, which I loved and it was the only pie I would eat. Having turkey wasn’t that big of a deal to me, as living on a farm we had fresh chicken a lot for Sunday dinner, and there isn’t really that much difference.

Thanksgiving to me was all about the Pilgrims and the Indians getting together for the very first one, and as history writes, it then became a tradition. Having more time off from school for thanksgiving was great, but as a kid, I didn’t know what being thankful really meant, because I’d come to expect most everything I got. I was no different than most American kids in that regard.

I think that to truly know thankfulness we first have to know need. When my favorite uncle came to visit, and brought my sister and me gifts, my mom would ask me, “What do you say?” and then I’d tell my uncle “Thank you.” I wasn’t really being thankful; I was just acting out what I’d been trained to do on command.

At that age I also didn’t understand what “need” was. Oh, I knew I needed air to breathe, water to drink, etc., but I knew nothing yet of the life experiences that would instruct me on the other things I would need in order to have a full life.

I would guess that it’s incredibly hard to feel thankful if we’ve literally gotten every single material thing we’ve ever wanted handed to us our whole lives. Living in such an environment, why would we feel thankful for anything; unless we’d experienced having a need that was out of our reach before we became wealthy?

I think this shows that when we can easily get whatever we want, we become less and less thankful for that which we receive. We then steadily promote the thought in our own minds that we’re entitled to whatever we get which then leaves absolutely no opportunity for the spontaneity of true thankfulness to ever show its face.

I think that thankfulness boils down to being something that doesn’t come naturally. I think it’s a quality that all of us can potentially add to our character, but also one in which too many of us will never show an interest.

Personally, I’m thankful that I am one who is able to recognize value in people and deeds, and to direct my thanks to the deserving parties. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

_{’Tis the Season © free-reign 2019}

Sources for images used in this post:

_{Festive Scene: Image by Jill Wellington from Pixabay
Christmas Table: Image by Jill Wellington from Pixabay
Santa’s Sleigh: Image by OpenClipart-Vectors from Pixabay
Happy Thanksgiving: Image by Oberholster Venita from Pixabay}