Being a Gemini has it's up sides...yep.
Well, there's the versatile and communicative, the witty and the liveliness, the curious, charming and creativeness...
Ahem.
Notice consistency, follow through and decisiveness didn't quite make the cut.
I can 100% decide what I'm going to do...the way I feel about something because of my innermost morals and values and I can defend it to the core and then the wind will blow and I can be convinced (or just change my mind) and I totally go in the opposite direction. This probably seems so strange to non fence straddlers.
I understand.
I don't like this quality either, but it is who I am, and try to play defense most of the time just to counteract my impulses for change.
You can imagine how this personality deficit affected me during the recent elections. Sheesh.
This is NOT about the country's leaders however...nope...this is WAY MORE IMPORTANT...
this is about whether to display and/or partake in any Christmas decorating before Thanksgiving.
There.
I said it.
I have these morals that tell me I should wait to turn on Jingle Bells and start making
I don't have morals concerning food.
Let me try again.
I have tried very hard to make it a tradition at Casa Griffith to wait until the evening of Thanksgiving or the Friday after (depending on what DaddiO is working) to put up the glorious Arbol de Navidad (that's Christmas tree for my non espanol amigos.) Some years I make it, some years I don't. Sometimes yes, sometimes no. That drives me BONKERS. Traditions are supposed to be the SAME, year after year. Hence the word tradition! Will my children grow up and say...well...sometimes we put the tree up on November 18...sometimes Thanksgiving night, one year not until December 1. What kind of horrible mother am I anyway??
Well, I'm a mom that thinks I can feel strongly about relishing one season for the amount of time that feels right and then moving to the next. And maybe that's not the same every year.
When first born was in 1st grade, he developed a scary rash and inflamed knee and after rushing to UVA Hospital, a failed attempt to drain non-existent fluid from his knee in the ER, and about a dozen different opinions, the doctor of infectious disease finally identifies as Henoch-Schonlein purpura (HSP) Click here for description and visual (scary, right?)
We were supposed to have Thanksgiving at Momaw & Papaw Griffy's that year, but it didn't happen that way. Sometimes life doesn't happen according our idea of tradition even though we give it our all. Sometimes we just have to play the field and adjust our traditions to what life throws our way. We decorated the tree downstairs that year with Riley on the sofa with his leg propped up.
I have felt rage over the last week or two at the sight of Christmas decorations filling the stores and hearing some of my friends speak of putting trees up and Christmas shopping.
While I can't defend Walmart because I think they are mostly motivated by dollar signs and not the holidays in their hearts, I will stop judging the rest of you all and say, by all means, if you have Christmas in your heart on Oct. 14 and want to cocoon yourself in the warm and glow of Christmas, then by all means, do so. What does it hurt? Furthermore, I came home from work today to an empty house and thought I'd clean a little. I turned on the music channel and landed on Holidays & Happenings and Christmas Music was playing. I started to turn it but thought...What the heck...
Then I realized I hadn't had lunch and I decided to have an orange. I peeled the orange and it reminded me of Christmas Eves past at Church when I was a little girl...candlelight services and then over in the fellowship hall for oranges and candy canes and Santa would stop by.
Now I want my tree up.
Tradition straddler.
