UnChristmasing Christmas

by Timothy J. Suder
(Chalfont)

Ahhh...Christmas time is here once again to remind us all that the haunting whispers of impending hecticity heard throughout the year by all whom have inherited the ways of our predecessors celebratory yuletide festivities, have not, nor shall they ever (so long as we continue our anticipatory anticipations) lost their tendency to provoke that ever urgent sense of desperation to satiate eleven months worth of insatiables.
Although I certainly should have begun my preparations (in order not to be considered a procrastinator amongst the professional pseudo-happiness gift givers) somewhere around the middle of May, I've sickeningly become ever so fond of the stress induced last-minuteness that has been inherited by my Christmas season subconscious. The ensuing battle to which I've grown accustom, were it to be forfeited to a younger, more naïve and well-prepared shopper which was me, would indefinitely in turn lessen the heights to which my nerves have attained whilst seeking the prize during the annually ever shortening course of my self-imposed down to the wire time constraints. No Sir, not I, not now, nor never again, shall I be considered amongst the majority of the prepared, the professional, the elite gift-giving-gurus, for I have lost, yet somehow found my dimly lighted Christmas preparations niche, misunderstood by the masses, but so naturally form-fitted to me for having taken the last 38 years to have acquired.
Were it not for the terrifyingly avant guard implications inflicted upon all who attempt the way of the aforementioned for their ventures into the unguided, couponless path of the unwittingly unprofessional only-9-days-left nature of the ill-prepared Christmas shopper, to which I and a select few have acclimated ourselves to, the merry, bright, noel-esque ambiance intended by the great St. Nick, would remain forever, within and without the joyfully-lit halls of our mannequin infested Christmassy corporate conundrums.
Therefore, should we assume to consider alternative measures in which to satiate our desire during the course of time that Christmas is not, in order to please our fellow kindred, neighbors, friends and the like, must we never forget that although we have merely allotted ourselves this one time annually in which to alleviate ourselves of our monetary woes just to remember them next year in a couple of weeks, had we conglomerately convened on the annual quarters, we would not have found our quarterly holiday elations rapidly dissipating so shortly following the next familial function.
So systemically systematic has the procedural process of sociologically solutionizing our formatted activities in which we partake to separate our free-time luxuries from those required to sustain any semblance of the normalcy written upon the lives of humanity. Ahh...Christmas, a time of relaxation, family and fun, gift-giving and a time for doing the things we choose to do without the pressures of having to do them. Were I of the more intelligent sort, I'd start shopping now for next-years' festivities...but I'll wait.