The Christmas season is upon us once again. Well, at least I think it is. For me, the holiday season begins the day after Thanksgiving. Before this, I won’t pull out or put up any decorations or even acknowledge Christmas decor in the stores, even though it now seems to make its first appearance around the Fourth of July.
This year, I was in Key West for the traditional start of the holiday season in my world and I’ve been playing catch up ever since.
I knew this was going to happen, of course. If I don’t get the tree up on the post-Thanksgiving weekend, it may not happen at all. This isn’t a Grinch-like response to the holidays. Rather, it’s a “is this really worth all the work just to have take it down three weeks from now?” proposition.
The tree and decorations did go up yesterday. It’s 13 days from Christmas Eve and 14 to Christmas itself. That’s cutting it pretty close.
I thought I might compensate for the holidays this year by going to the holiday parade in Key West. But I always find it really hard to get into the Christmas spirit when it’s 75 degrees out and the sun is beating down on you day in and day out. This is a place that has never experienced frost, let alone snow.
It’s an odd feeling driving through the town, seeing traditional holiday displays in the yards of residents – snow globes, Christmas trees, Santa standing in a winter wonderland – all in the tepid heat of the tropics. Santa would look much more at home in candy cane striped shorts than a wool and fur suit, quite frankly.
The parade is equally strange. I mean this in the “strange as in really sweet strange, not a creepy, Stephen King kind of strange.” The whole town turns out and where the Macy’s Day parade in New York only has one Santa, there is a Santa on darn near every float in the Key West version. There’s the skinny one in surfer shorts, the gay one, the cross dressing one, Santas in nearly every shade of human imaginable – it is so delightful in Key West, a place where it is almost impossible to stand out.
Florida as a whole is a difficult place to get into the Christmasy spirit. While it will be in the 40s in Seattle where I am from this week, dipping into the low 30s at night, it’ll be in the mid 70s here on the coast of Florida. My brain and body won’t give in that it’s really Christmas. I could go for a dip in the Atlantic this afternoon if I wanted, but the water is unseasonably cold right now, about 70 degrees. No one in Florida goes swimming at this time of year in the ocean – too damned cold.
Still, I try to soldier on. I watched a couple of Christmas specials yesterday. They were cute, and they did the trick, though I admit that if I see one more holiday movie set in New York City I am going to lose my holiday cookies.
Of course, no one wants to watch a holiday movie set in Florida, at least not a Christmas movie. I understand that. While everyone is freezing their arses off in the Great White North, the last thing you want to do is tune in to a romantic holiday comedy set in Miami where everyone is running around in shorts and bikinis during the Christmas season. No one in the frigid GNC wants to see happy people cavorting on the beaches when they are at home, the heat turned up, three layers of clothing on, and facing the dark and dreariness of winter for at least another three months.
I know. I used to be in the middle of it. Still, it seemed more like the holidays than balmy Florida. I remember my first trip to Florida. I was still married to my ex-whatever and she, my son and I came down here just after 9/11. We had rented a house in the Florida Panhandle.
Instead of the traditional winter wonderland scene at the mall, Santa sat in front of a real sandcastle, about 15 feet high. I definitely knew I wasn’t in Kansas anymore, not that I ever wanted to be in Kansas in the first place. Santa rode down the street the day after Thanksgiving in a convertible, surrounded by scantily clad elves tossing candy to all the people who were headed to the beach for the day. Very surreal.
Now, I know my northern friends aren’t going to be very sympathetic to my plight. As they are rummaging through their drawers to find one more layer of clothing to fend off the arctic air, I am sitting here in a pair of shorts and t-shirt writing this.
As far as the holidays, I am still trying to play catchup. Yesterday, while I put up the tree, I watched the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. The smell of turkey wafted from the oven, as did the requisite scents of fresh baked pumpkin pie, stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy. Yes, Thanksgiving at my house was Dec. 11 this year.
I will still be eating Thanksgiving leftovers by the time Christmas rolls around, given the fact that it was a 25 pound turkey and there is enough stuffing here to feed 20. I am already thinking what the hell I will do with all the turkey and trimmings in my refrigerator. Given the fact that there is no room left for anything else, I can only imagine this means turkey tetrazzini, turkey salad, turkey kabobs, turkey enchiladas, turkey omelets, turkey burgers… sigh.
So, the fruitless attempt to catch up continues. I now have two weeks to cram a whole month of shopping, eating, Christmas carols and eggnog into. I don’t know if my poor body can handle the punishment that it will endure with this compressed timeframe.
Well, the good news is, I won’t have any problem looking like Santa when Christmas finally arrives, given the added goodies. On the down side, gift giving is damned hard here. Ever try to shinny down an airconditioning vent?
Out on the Treasure Coast, trying to get my holiday game on and so far it’s goose eggs all around,
– Robb