I get a bit depressed at Christmas time. And it is present on a few levels. Christmas time, with it's expectation of happy families, trains a spotlight on my broken family. I am divorced and have been for a long time. My marriage was not a happy one. I have also been alone for a long time.
And most of the time, I just accept this and live in the moment; day by day, moment by moment. I try not to carry the burdens of the past while I am living in the present.
But it's harder at Christmas time.
I have much to be thankful for; I have my two girls and I am very close to them. And I have a little grand son now, so most of the time Christmas is OK. But there's always that little shadow of grief and regret which remains.
Another reason for that is because my son died 7 years ago, and now Christmas will never be the same, because he will always be missing.
And the reasons for the depression doesn't stop there, I'm afraid. I hate the whole tinsel and Santa in-your-face, let's party and over eat and spend all our money, attitude. We gorge ourselves on food and drink, celebrating.... what?
As a practising Christian, I celebrate the birth of Jesus and we keep it simple. We don't go overboard with food or alcohol and we keep gift giving non-extravagant too.
For the life of me, I can't see what the secular world sees in Christmas. They worship the mighty dollar and Santa I guess. They spend heaps of their hard-earned cash on expensive presents which their loved ones don't need and often throw away. All the tinsel and ornaments end up in land-fill and domestic violence is the end result in a lot of families.
This spoils it for me too. I find it so hedonistic, selfish, degenerate and offensive. I wish we could go back to celebrating the birth of the Christ-child; he who came to bring Life and peace to those who enter into relationship with Him. I wish the Christian community could move Christmas to another time of the year and we can reverence and celebrate appropriately. The rest of the secular world can have "Santa Day" or "mighty dollar day" or "who can get the drunkest" day.
There's even another reason for my depression at Christmas time. I have a very modest income, and have had for decades. So when my kids were with me, it was a difficult time, finding the money to buy them something they would like but was within my small budget. I always felt like my gifts were not good enough. I know that sounds like I was joining the great rush to buy expensive gifts, but it wasn't like that. I just didn't have enough to buy quality things, so would have to compromise with junky stuff. I hated it.
So, while I browse and shop this year, this heavy feeling accompanies me; I wonder if what I'm buying is what they want, and will it be good enough. It's a kind of left-over emotional stone that still weighs me down a bit.
And as I walk through the shops with all the rubbishy "stuff" and the Christmas music and the crowds, I feel like we are cheating ourselves; settling for the cheap and meaningless and unsustainable, when we could be entering into relationship with the God who made everything; with the God who sent his son to be like us, so He could understand our sorrow and walk with us through every journey.
We've swapped the Creator for the crass.
And I find it all a bit depressing.
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