Read this on galpod.com.
We don't celebrate Christmas. Makes sense, being Jewish and all. My partner and I are technically atheists, so we don't subscribe to any of this, but we do celebrate the main Jewish holidays, namely Passover and Rosh HaShana (New Year, which is in September). We also celebrate the ones we think are fun, like Shavu'ot (dairy dishes!) and Hannukah. Now, Hannukah isn't really a holiday; it's not even in the bible. Not that we care about this stuff, but it's not technically a Holy Day. And it's one of my favourites, so I enjoy passing that on to my kids. We just light candles and sing songs. Oh, and eat doughnuts. It's a good holiday.
But all around us, there's so much craziness. There are Christmas parties in various social contexts and don't even get me started on the (state!) school's Christmas concerts. Yes, multiple. Several of my kids' friends are not allowed to participate in any of the Christmas activities, but because we don't believe in any of this stuff, we don't mind. We talk about it at home, which is very tricky because most of their friends believe in Santa, and I don't want to be that mum. It's enough that they became the ones in charge of sex-ed for their classmates.
So, like everyone else this time of year, we're running. To get to random Christmas parties and events, to manage to catch all the fantastic Christmas shows and lights and stuff. We like the panto thing, which is very British (there's nothing like it in Canada that I know of) so we go to that. And we all love ice-skating (obviously), so we try to go several times before they close the exorbitant rinks in early January.
And then December sucks for me personally. This year we started talking about my dad's memorial in November so I've been a bit out of it for a month now, and December isn't looking good either. I was talking to my mom today, and we both think that it's because it's the first year that we're expected to "move on". Last year was the first year, so it was natural and acceptable for us to be under-functioning. But this year we were supposed to have gotten over it or something. And even that I know in my head that it's BS, I think I was expecting myself to be over it. Or at least to be better this year. I think that's why I still have that voice in my head saying but what if you're just indulging?
Anyway, all this to say that I'm feeling frazzled and like I'm behind and late and forgetting something. And that's a place I haven't been in for a while, so it's weird. I don't particularly like this place either, but I try to just sit with it. So far I'm failing miserably, which results in a lot of time wasted on phone games. But I'm trying.
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