I don't usually get depressed during December; I save that for January and February. But this year I'm feeling really down. I know it's because I'm not getting enough sleep, but it still sucks.

How do you feel during the holidays? Do you get the blues?

-- Anonymous, December 10, 1999

Answers

Not USUALLY. Seeing the kids or Barb open presents always made it better for me, and even when I was single, my parents would swoop into town then. I always felt pretty good about Christmas.

Obviously, this year is going to be a little different, though, without Jamie. But we'll manage. Brian's going to San Diego Christmas afternoon and coming back on the 31st, so I know he'll have a good time.

Uh oh. What if Eric thinks Brian is gone like JAMIE's gone? Brian's gone on trips before but...

I'm going to have to think on this. The problem is, since Eric can't talk back, I'm never sure how much he understands...maybe we can let him hear Brian on the phone a few times that week.

Al of Nova Notes.

-- Anonymous, December 10, 1999

I am not a Christmas person. Period.

I feel overwhelmed by obligations that seem to have nothing to do with my life or my wants. (Selfish girl, aren't I?) I like to give people gifts, just not everyone at once. I like to give them when I am thinking of them, when I see something or find something or make something clearly for that person, and maybe when I know someone needs something nice. Doing this for everyone at once is fucking exhausting, and I hate it. Arbitrary obligation.

I dislike people labelling me as cold or a grinch because I don't feel uplifted by random carols blaring from every stereo and every speaker in stores. I like singing carols (even if I'm not into some of the sentiments or religion) but last year when people wanted to carol at my office party I almost gagged. Singing is something I do with my friends, not my coworkers.

Am I the only one who views these office holiday parties as just an extension of work? My company is quite small. People get upset if you don't attend.

Rant rant rant.

I don't know if I get the blues. I get overwhelmed, definitely.

-- Anonymous, December 10, 1999

Nope. Love Xmas. Love New Years. Love the lights, the sparkle and everything. I get _excited_ around the holidays. I'm like eternally hyper for weeks and don't calm down until mid-January and then I get hyped up again because my b-day is at the end of January.

So it's like, non-stop excitement for me until February.

-- Anonymous, December 10, 1999

Yes, the holidays make me homo/sui-cidal. That's why this year I've elected NOT to spend them with family. I enjoy my family a lot more when the stress of the holiday is surrounding their visit. I am still trying to figure out when I enjoy the in-laws.

After the fiasco that was Thanksgiving, I've come to the conclusion that only an incredibly stupid glutton for punishment would continue to share the holidays with either my family or his. I invariably end up in tears and with the pregnancy hormones kicking in hard, we've decided to spend it at home with our little boy, our baby on the way and the two cats.

It's a very cool experience to talk about having Christmas with OUR family for a change and get to look forward to having a tearfree Christmas. I'm looking forward to relaxing and enjoying watching our son enjoy his last solo Christmas before we bless/curse him with a sibling.

I hope you feel better, Beth. Maybe this weekend will help that along. (I'll let you drink my share of the wine, if you'll sneak me a smidgen of cheesecake and not tell my doctor.)

--Wendy

-- Anonymous, December 10, 1999

Well, I am somewhat stressed this year. I am STILL trying to finish my family room. Been working on it for 3 1/2 months! The painting is done, the new ceiling light has been installed, the floor is all laid, except for one corner where I had to replace some of the subfloor and I am having a heck of a time getting it level enough to lay tiles on. My trowel is so gucked up and heavy with hardened skim coat stuff, I just bought a new one last night. Then, also last night I found out the 3 tall bookcases I just positioned and filled need to be moved over 2 inches in order to accommodate the new vertical blinds I hope I'm able to install before Heather gets home. And the tree is only half up...and the living room and dining room are filled with family room junk I really don't want to put back in my family room. And Holly is in Israel and won't be home for Christmas, but at least she has given up on trekking 20 days across the desert to arrive at the pyramids in time for the New Year. They're planning to hitch and take a bus instead. So it will be quite different this year with just Heather and me, but I am very, very glad she'll be home for Christmas.

-- Anonymous, December 10, 1999

Oh, I love the holidays! But I don't have many people to buy for, just my husband and my folks. Well, and Kymm Zuckert because she put me on her gift list years ago and now we're caught in a death spiral of gift giving and card exchanging and generally trying to inundate the other with evidence of thoughtfulness. Which is actually kind of fun.

But the best part of Christmas is all the lights. Houses look so cheerful with colored lights on them, and the glimpses of Christmas trees through fogged up windows is like looking inside a Faberge egg.

-- Anonymous, December 10, 1999

I do not get depressed during the holidays. I simply continue on the depression from the rest of the months.

This year, I have giddyness & less depression, but that's not really related to the holidays. Well, maybe a bit from the realization that I should start shopping sometime here....

-- Anonymous, December 10, 1999

I do agree about office parties. I may be different, though, because I prefer the ones that happen after work and include families. Those are fun and they don't interfere with my billable hours. The ones during work (like the one I'm skipping right as we speak) make me crazy. I don't get paid to be here unless I'm working, people. Don't force me to be jolly.

Nyah, nyah, nyah, Ashley. I bought your presents from me and Jeremy last week. I'm all done! Whee! Of course, we still have to shop for your impossible-to-shop-for parents, but I'm going to make Jeremy do that. If you have any ideas, please pass them along.

-- Anonymous, December 10, 1999

Yeah, the holidays are a major pain in the neck. Work backlogs because decision makers are on vacation, and last-minute crises invariably make me come back to the office from Christmas as some terribly unreasonable time (three years ago I had to get up at 3 a.m. on 12/26 to make it to a meeting in NY City at 9).

I'd trade Christmas for a good 3-day weekend at home, anytime. Ditto July 4th and Labor Day. They just raise the specter of my being out of the office and push my bosses' panic buttons without giving me a dam' thing. Bleh.

-- Anonymous, December 10, 1999

I used to hate Christmas until a few years ago my husband forced me to agree to not go anywhere on Christmas day. Now we do an extended family gift exchange and brunch sometime in advance and have a relaxed nuclear (SP?!) family day at home on the 25th. No More Tears! No More Fights! yay!

So now I actually look forward to Xmas, kind of. Last year I let the "we're not feeling Christmassy yet" thing we get into every year go on too long and we didn't get a tree and didn't indulge in our usual Christmas item kitch-fest. I missed it. This year all the stuff comes out even if we don't feel like it. It will get us in the mood.

New Years is for staying at home or having a couple of friends over, as far as I'm concerned. This year especially. Who wants to be out there with the millenium party goers? Not me.

Jill

-- Anonymous, December 10, 1999

I used to -- oh God I used to. Christmas was full-bore manic depression season, an excuse to turn up the peevish, misanthropic rhetoric, and indulge in brooding depressions, all in one. What a bargain!

For some reason, I don't feel the onset of the Xmas blues this year. Perhaps it's the fact that my routine has been broken, or that I have to be a bit less self-indulget with K. around, but I'm remarkably even-minded about Xmas this year. Perhaps it took me this long to get over the deep nostalgia and longing I used to feel around the holidays when I was a child. I'm open for theories.

-- Anonymous, December 10, 1999

Oh yes, I hate this time of year. My parents and most of my relatives are dead so it sucks. It really, really sucks. I know I should be thankful for my wonderful husband and daughter, and I am, but it always feels like somebody is missing.

Wherever you are mom and dad, I miss you terribly and Christmas has never been the same.

Wake me when it's over.

-- Anonymous, December 10, 1999

I get stressed about all the holiday parties between our jobs and school and the clients and etc. I do not like holiday parties, especially when I have to help with them in some way. UGH. Other than that, I have a smooth-sailing holiday season.

I tried to put Bailey in a t-shirt once... you know what he did? He ATE it!

-- Anonymous, December 11, 1999

Oh yeah.. the parents. I can usually find something for mom fairly easily... Finding something she'll actually use is another story. I have the hardest time shopping for dad... I mean, what do you get for the man who hates everything? (Okay, maybe not everything, but seeing as I can't afford car parts or computer components, it might as well be) I usually latch on to the fact he likes physics, and go from there....

Let's just ignore the New Years wanting-someone-to-kiss thing, shall we? Bah.

-- Anonymous, December 11, 1999

Oh yeah, Christmas is the most stressful time of the year for me. All those "so have you finished your shopping yet??" questions. We don't do Christmas much, just exchange gifts with each other & various other people. But just hearing everyone at work talk about all they have to do gets me a little stressed.

I kind of like the way the lights look but we aren't putting them up ourselves. We've never had a tree - it feels like a chore instead of something fun.

I like to give people gifts, but I hate having this arbitrary deadline of December 25. And I hate having to think of things to give the people I'm not close to, and to get things from them that I don't really want. When I got involved with Pat I got a whole set of people to exchange gifts with - he just got my mom. We work this out by having the things for his family come from both of us with me only paying for some of them. Our gifts to each other are usually things we tell each other we want, and we get them whenever we feel like it. We both have January birthdays, too, and handle them the same way. Sometimes I buy my own birthday present (usually jewelry) and he pays me back. I get what I want and he doesn't have to shop for it. It works for us.

Since I hate the season, I put off actually buying the rest of the gifts as long as I can, so that when I finally have to do it, the stores are all crowded and I can hardly bear to leave my house. I get very cynical about all the stores wishing me the happiest of holidays, and I get tired of the holiday music. I try to remind myself that for other people, these are happy reminders of their favorite time of year. A few months from now I won't be able to get enough of store decorations with beach umbrellas and surfing music on the loudspeaker.

My mom is impossible to buy for - she doesn't want or need anything. Doesn't want luxurious things she wouldn't buy for herself. Would just as soon get books or videos from the library. I try to think of useful things or get her fun things. Luckily she seems to like whatever I get her, but it frustrates me because I want to get her something she'll like and usually have no clue.

This year the couples we usually exchange gifts with are all broke because we all have house payments now, so we decided to just give cheap fun gifts. I'm very grateful for that.

-- Anonymous, December 13, 1999

Oh yeah, I wanted to say that you guys have the same linoleum or whatever it is in your kitchen that we do. Ours has small green squares instead of black, though. I love it and don't notice if it's dirty. I am a slattern.

-- Anonymous, December 13, 1999

I don't enjoy the holiday season, for a variety of reasons. Ever since my fiance died, the holiday season has been a reminder of all the things we planned to do but didn't get the chance to do. Our wedding date was Christmas Eve. His birthday was the 19th. There are just so many things I miss about him at this time.

Then, there is the family thing. My family is not close and never has been, but events of this past year have made it much worse. My brother, the one I have always been closest to, died in September of bone cancer. When he knew that there was nothing left to be done, he went Christmas shopping. His wife sent my presents last week. It's bad, just bad.

Then, my birthday is four days after Christmas, and it's always been kind of lost in the shuffle.

Selfish. That's me.

I do enjoy shopping for presents -- thinking of the perfect thing for my friends. But a nicer idea to me is not to do it when it's expected, but "just because."

-- Anonymous, December 14, 1999

Unfortunately, I can top you all. Five years ago, the day before Christmas Eve, I discovered my mother had been having an affair behind my father's back for over nine months. She had an apartment with this guy, had taken a trip with him -- the whole nine yards. I had to tell my Dad. Meanwhile, my mother's father was literally on his deathbed, passing away just a few days later. My family had just about gotten over this mess and begun to enjoy the holidays in the last few years when Mom drops another bombshell. She's marrying the jerk from the affair on this Christmas Eve and wants us all to attend. I think I'll pass. Despite this though, my husband and I are having a pretty good Christmas so far. Put the tree up last Saturday and have two-thirds of the shopping done. The mess with my mother just made me realize that you have to appreciate what you have when you have it. Right now I have a great husband, wonderful in-laws, two cool sisters, plus a great dad with a new, nice stepmom for me. They are going to get my attention and energy this season. And my mom, well, my expectations for her have dropped over the last five years, so I'm not that shocked when she does something stupid or insensitive. I still love her, and I have mostly learned to accept her. But I'll be damned if I celebrate that marriage.

-- Anonymous, December 15, 1999