I love the holiday season. From Halloween until January 1 is truly is the most wonderful time of the year with the decorations, family and friends getting together and the overall good mood it puts people in. But I have to say that I am not a fan of how the holiday season I love so much starts earlier and earlier each year.
November 1st, 2011: I walk into the local Target, eager to get whatever leftover Halloween candy wasn’t bought during the season. I was looking forward to bargains on Halloween decorations and major discounts on the candy! But as I rounded the corner, I discovered something rather upsetting.
The entire Halloween display was gone! In its place stood a Christmas tree! In the beginning of November!
This always makes me sad, when people completely bypass the lovely months of autumn to go straight to from early fall to a winter wonderland. It not only forces us to feel stressed about Christmas shopping earlier, but it also makes the year go by so much faster!
I am faithful to the holidays. I believe they should all get a grace period after they end so that we can back off slowly and then transition to the next. Unfortunately, I am discovering that I am one of few people like this.
I look to the Thanksgiving Day Parade as the true indicator of the start of the holiday season. Give Thanksgiving its chance to have the spotlight and embrace friends, family and food. Then the Christmas songs can start on the radio and decorations can begin toslowly appear. This is the ideal. Santa Claus is at the end of the parade for a reason – to signal that the holiday season has officially arrived!
This year, Santa was in the mall on November 19. Clearly, my ideal is very wishful thinking on my part. Do Christmas decorations really need to show up in malls before Halloween even ends? People often forget its true significance as they are busy being pushed in the direction of the winter holiday season by commercials, radio stations, stores, etc.
So let’s take time next year to slow down! We will stop shopping for Black Friday sales on Thanksgiving night, we will enjoy some turkey and stuffing and calmly wait for the arrival of Father Christmas and the holiday season!