Christmas is a time for the familiar: having a few drinks with friends, checking off the food in the oven on Christmas day whilst you scream during Pictionary, decorating the house with shiny baubles and dusting off that singing Santa that has haunted you for decades. You know whether you’re with friends on Christmas Eve, with your parents on Christmas or with the grandparents on Boxing Day. Usually.
Sometimes there’s a spanner thrown in the works. All the familiarity and schedules are thrown into disarray. You may be celebrating Christmas in a new country, in a new city or even just a new house in the same town. Suddenly, Christmas isn’t how it’s always been. Christmas has become unfamiliar. The emotional rollercoaster that comes with this new setting during the familiar festival is hard to digest, but as a fellow sufferer of the unfamiliar Christmas, I’m here to offer some advice on how to deal with the anxiety and alienation.
1. Surround yourself with the familiar
A wise saying I’ve heard during a big move is that ‘people make a home, not the walls that surround you’. Moving from your childhood home can be daunting, but if you’re surrounded by familiar people at Christmas time this can make the anxiety disappear in a moment. You may slowly be drowning in a brick house infested with cardboard boxes that you can’t avoid bumping into, but it’s all worth it when your little sister puts those knackered reindeer antlers on the dog who just paws at his own head. A new house becomes a home when it’s filled with all those petty arguments you have with your parents or all the insanely embarrassing in-jokes you share with your siblings. Even just hugging a pet makes you forget about the sea of objects packaged away inside those boxes. Although the unfamiliar can make you feel trapped, I recommend staying at home, playing board games with the family, eating the same Tyrells sweet chilli crisps you like to eat, decorating with those old broken Disney ornaments. Put up frames full of pictures from back home. The feelings you associate with those objects will automatically transform the place as well as your attitude.2. Go shopping!
This may seem like expensive advice but trust me, it’s a winner. One of the best things about a new move is all the old rubbish you had to throw out. This makes plenty of room for you to replace all the groggy objects with shiny new things. You can make your house a home by buying all of the colour tinsel you like, a chair you are actually comfortable in, a Christmas jumper that you actually enjoy wearing and not a garish one that shrunk in the wash three years ago. Embrace everything new in the new house! What better way to celebrate the refreshing evolution of migrating to a new location by filling it with lots of new things? Shopping enables you to experience and live in that house you’ve always dreamt of by exciting you about everything new in the world! It’s the perfect metaphor (and the perfect excuse for a shopping spree).
3. Don’t forget technology
Technology is a wonderful thing in the twenty-first century. The list is endless: text, Skype, Snapchat, Whatsapp. All are glorious ventures designed for you to keep in touch with the friends and family you’re not with during the Christmas moments. Organise a small trip to stay with your best pal in Bath for a few days, put aside at least a good hour to Skype home and get involved in the party (even if that means your brother playing ‘We Wish You a Merry Christmas’ on the piano as your mum waves a present in front of the camera saying ‘not long now’). Don’t become lazy and stop putting in the effort to keep in contact with all of your childhood friends and the family you’re slowly growing up away from. Technology is important to keep the familiar in your life. Embrace it! Even if it’s a silly selfie on your Whatsapp group, it will maintain those familiar feelings.
A familiar celebration such as Christmas can add anxiety when you’re surrounded by the unfamiliar, but if you embrace it, this new Christmas will be the best one yet!
Edited by Naomi Upton
Image sources:
BestLowPrices: http://bestlowprice2u.com/new-house-christmas-ornament.html
Giphy.com: http://giphy.com/gifs/
SmilesOfIndia.com: http://smilesofindia.com/2015/07/25/6-reasons-why-your-cousins-are-your-…