Invoking The Christmas Spirit

[poliphilo]

I see-saw on the subject of Christmas. Last year I worked up so much enthusiasm for it I almost lapsed back into Christianity, this year I've been having a hard job getting into the mood. The weather doesn't help. Last year we had heavy snowfalls in early December; this year it's still mild and autumnal and we're having lots of rain.

The Christmas myth demands extreme weather- clear skies, many stars, "earth as hard as iron, water like a stone". If it isn't perishing outside all the glitter and artificial warmth we throw against the season seems like wasted ammunition.

I wonder what an Australian Christmas feels like. Really weird I should think.

Anyway, Ailz has been nudging me to put the tree up. The first time she did it I reacted with disbelief. "What, is it really that time of year again?" Then I looked at the calendar and saw that it was.

So, we made a bit of an effort. We invited Odi and Fabrizio to come round and help us put up the tree. There was loudness and bounciness and several bottles of wine were consumed.

Comments

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I hate the forced jollity of so many Christmas songs.

[ibid.livejournal.com]

I loathe non religious Xmas music without exception. Carols have a dignity and beauty, others are seriously annoying.

Santa is pulled along by white kangaroos. Everyone is in shorts and it feels very wrong!

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Christmas is a midwinter festival. That's what it's for- to dispel the midwinter gloom. It makes no sense to celebrate it at mid-summer.

I've been trying to think of a modern Christmas song I like- and not succeeding. I guess I can stand Lennon's War is Over ditty- but he stole the tune and really it's not so much as Christmas song as a cunningly disguised piece of agit-prop.

[ibid.livejournal.com]

It's part of a wider Australian malaise, as a nation I honestly believe most Aussies think they are a suburb of London. Maybe had the colonists had a time to develop away from the mother country it might have been different but the growth of Australia co-incided with the growth of communications technology.

And most of the north never gets any winter gloom, so by your logic they should have no Christmas at all!