Kathleen McCall:
Occasional�� Muse�

2001-12-19 - 8:49 a.m.

It Can't Be

They put it on the same day every year. Every single year, the exact same day in the exact same month. Every year, December comes right after November, right in order like that, and the 25th comes right after the first 24 days. Been doing that as far back as I can remember, and it's STILL a shock every year.

BF says on the weekend, "So about next Sunday..." (when we're serving an early Christmas dinner for his visiting parents.)

And predictably I say, "No, not NEXT Sunday."

"Yes, it is, next Sunday is the 23rd."

"No, it can't be."

He knows me well enough to let it drop. He could go get the calendar and put it in my face, but he knows that somewhere in the conversation I've figured out that he's right, and now my "No" doesn't mean "you're wrong", it means "please God don't let it be so."

They snuck the damn thing right up on me again.

I still have decorations in boxes, you know. It can't be just a week away. What about my decorations? If they don't come out now, they don't come out at all. What about the Nativity Molded Plastic Playset that I thought was such a great idea when the kids were little, the one they could actually handle and lose the pieces to, the one that gave new meaning to the phrase "Searching for Jesus"? "Hey! Who the hell ran off with the baby again??!!" What about the string of singing lights that play "The 22 Most Irritating Electronic Christmas Carols in the World" and conclusively prove that I love my children more than my sanity? What about the big three-tiered wooden Christmas Carousel that goes round and round powered by the heat from candles if the candles hadn't melted all over everything while stored for the summer in a hot garage? How can it be Christmas without these things?

I haven't done my baking. I LOVE Christmas baking. I always put it off until the last minute and then arrive bearing breads and cookies and candies and get that "Oh, MY, you SHOULDN'T have" response, which in translation means "I have already eaten more Candy Christmas Crap than I can stand, please don't dump your baking off at MY house." I've often thought of doing my baking in February. February is grey and boring; wouldn't Christmas cookies liven it up some? Plus, I'd have time to do it. But then, people might think I'd BAKED at Christmas and was only just DELIVERING the stuff.

Well, it simply can't be Christmas this soon. Oh no, it isn't. There must be at least a few more weeks before we actually have to DO this, actually have to put on fancy clothes and make minestrone for Christmas Eve (note to self: do in reverse order, idiot) and wrap all those Santa packages and find all the stocking stuffers I've cleverly hidden even from myself. There MUST be.

Damn, I'm glad I left my self-adhesive Wise Men up on the window all year.

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