| Xmas rant: I am not you |
[Dec. 3rd, 2004|12:28 am]
Just me.
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In case you don't already know this, I am a 34 year old unmarried, non-cohabitating woman, with no children, and my nearest living relative lives 2677 miles away. From this you might (should?) conclude that 1) I don't always spend Thanksgiving or Xmas with my "family"
2) being a single woman, I am either too busy mackin' on guys (because I'm single, and that's what single gals do) and/or moping about having no boyfriend (because I'm single, and that's what single gals do) to do the kinds of things you people with SigOtters and/or families do during the holidays.
this means:
I do not cook a turkey for just me for Thanksgiving
I do not generally get an Xmas tree (although I have on occasion; I believe it was twice, in the last 10 years).
I do not hang a stocking by the chimney for me, and certainly not for my 2 cats, because I am not a pathetic single woman whose only friends are her cats.
I do not string lights on my shrubs for the neighbors to gawk at (as they already have plenty to look at what with the boat planter and the robot sculpture)
I do not buy Christmas CDs, nor play Xmas CDs I bought in prior years.
I do not own red sweatshirts decorated with quilted trees, reindeer, or snowmen with bells sewed on.
So I found it especially befuddling when a cow-orker from another department today strikes up a conversation 10 minutes into the workday with "So, have you decorated your house for Christmas yet?"
I said, politely but sternly, "Actually, I don't really celebrate Christmas".
She got very silent, as if I'd said "Actually, I slaughter orphaned kittens and eat them raw". Probably because she's a Christian (I know this mainly because had she asked me a year ago about how she would go about using the employee perk of ordering discounted books through our vendor to get a leather-bound Bible) and she probably figured I was either a Jew or an Atheist, and she'd never imagined that either of Those Kinds of People worked here.
Note that she didn't ask me if I decorated for Christmas at all, but if I'd done it YET (see High Fidelity, Evil Dead (or is it Evil Dead 2?) conversation on "yet" for further explication). That's what peeved me; even if I'm not a Jew, a Muslim, or an Atheist, why should I waste my time doing something as mundane and dull as seasonal house decorating?* Given my age and demographic, I should either be whoring about or desperately seeking a life partner rather than stringing popcorn or whatever the hell it is you people do to decorate your domiciles for The Holidays (tm).
I understand and am secure in the idea that I'm not a part of the dominant Amurikan culture; however, I thought the rest of those people would be able to detect this as well. The Somali chicks at Goodwill don't ask me how I'm enduring the Ramadan fast; why do suburban never-left-this-town PTA moms assume that a young single woman with a graduate degree and overdyed hair wants the same things out of life they do?
If I really wanted to screw with her, I'd tell her that the only way I celebrate Christmas is by participating in drunken Santa Rampages and giving bizarro toys to strangers. But I'm too considerate (and surreptitious) for that.
*not to disparage those of you who are *into* seasonal decorating, I'm talking about the idea of doing it because its expected because its What People Do. |
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