I'm a Christmas-aholic

My name is Le Bonheur, and I'm a Christmas-aholic.

Hi, Le Bonheur.

I love Christmas trees, little white lights, tinsel, hot cocoa, baking cookies, the Muppet's Christmas Carol, peppermint, snow (before it gets all grey and unpleasant), and I really love it when they wrap giant tinsel candy canes around the lamp posts of parking lots. For me, decorating a tree doesn't just take an afternoon, it takes weeks, it’s an organic process and one which I enjoy tremendously.

I love it, but Christmas last year was, as I’ve said before, “slightly tinged with crap.” My breakup began just days after New Years and when I think about that time, I remember sitting on my living room floor and packing my Christmas paraphernalia by myself in a rather unpleasant state (that is to put it mildly) and I was convinced that when a ‘future me’ opened those boxes in a future life I couldn’t possibly even fathom at that time, that ‘future me’ would be reminded of the breakup and my love of Christmas would be ruined due to the fact that I underwent a veritable, emotional shit-storm during the most happy, warm, and glittery time of the year. What a terrifying thought.

Now it’s almost 11 months later... into the future.

Right after Halloween I started eyeing the stores for signs of Christmas and when the Christmas candy appeared, I scanned myself for any signs of (a) being super pissed that Christmas was coming or (b) getting giddily excited that it was coming. Well, I got a little giddy and I have to admit that I was anxious too. So I thought I could maybe combat this anxious feeling by doing something I had always wanted to do. I’ve really wanted to be one of those people that puts their tree up like a day after Thanksgiving. My dreams are big, friends.

I traditionally never got around to putting up a tree until like 1 week before Christmas because I would often be waiting for my ex to find some time to accompany me to the tree lot, which he did all but once in our 4 yrs living together (we were together for 9). So I often would wait and wait until finally getting fed up and going to the tree lot alone and schlepping the tree into our apartment by myself. This was disappointing to say the least. I totally get that not everyone shares my love of this stuff but I would think, and I hope for in the future, that my partner would suck it up and do this with me for one reason and one reason only, because it would make me happy. But he never got that.

Just 2 days after Thanksgiving, I went to the tree lot with my mom to browse the selection and when I did, I noticed something kinda funny. I kept getting this grin on my face thinking that for the first time in years I was looking for my tree with a very different sense around me. I wasn't going to be buying it by myself and hauling it into an apartment I shared with someone else who really didn’t care, since I'm sure he would have preferred that we had no tree. I wasn’t going to decorate it alone while hoping that this someone else would join me, which he never did. No, I was doing it for myself and that made it so much better. Why? Well there would be no disappointments, and that’s sort of a big deal. I was doing it for me, and this made me smile. Big.

So the following day, we went back and picked out a perfectly-shaped, tall, narrow tree about 6 feet tall (the biggest one I’ve ever bought) and brought it home together. We decorated it with a few of my old ornaments and a collection of new ones (thank you, Ikea, for putting out such a rocking selection this year) and it’s really beautiful.

Now, I am one of “those people” and while that feels pretty great, I still have some residual worry about all this holiday business, so I’m currently thinking about the next thing I can do to keep me focusing on why I love this time of year.

So Dear Followers, if you are perhaps about to embark on the holidays as a newly single person, or as someone who maybe has had a rough year, what are some of the positive things going on right now that you can focus on? I’d love to know.