Big Mike: The True Spirit Of Xmas

Usually, I’ll happily admit that I’m a grinch. Gleefully, as a matter of fact. Heck, what with my white goatee and roundish tummy, I might even bellow Ho ho ho! to put an exclamation point on it.

I’ll let you in on a little secret, though. Sometimes I’m not all that comfortable thumbing my nose at Xmas. I mean, really, who wants to denigrate that season of sheer joy and loving, of reverence and piety, of selflessness and amity? Who’d deny any and all the fun of watching all those grinning little urchins…, um…, you know…, greedily tearing open packages of shit they’re going to toss in the bottom of the toy box or clutching all those gifts they’d demanded with all the subtlety of Hitler at Munich?

See? I can’t help myself. Normally, I don’t publicize my Xmas buzzkill feelings. Constance, the big potato over at The Book Case where I work a few days a week, asked me the other day what kind of decorations I put up for Xmas. Without thinking, I responded truthfully — “Aw, I don’t decorate for Xmas.”

Poor Constance. She recoiled and stared at me as if I’d said I decorate my tree with black leather masks, handcuffs, riding crops and double-dongs which, by the way, was how an old pal of mine named Gretchen used to decorate her tree. Remind me to tell you about her one day.

Anyway, I loathe Xmas because it’s one of the prime examples of how we lie to each other. You ask: What’s the big lie of Xmas? It’s this: every goddamned Xmas season people run around telling each other how much they long for the old Xmas spirit. They pine for the “true meaning” of Xmas. It’s all become so commercialized, so materialistic, they moan. This uttered as they whip out a hundred and three different credit cards to pay for some shit their kids are gonna toss in the bottom of the toy box within a week and a half.

By the way, this year’s shit is the Zhu zhu pet. Like Tickle Me Elmo and Cabbage Patch Kids of years past, kind loving and generous parents are gouging each others’ eyes out to snatch that last toy off the shelf of Toys R Us, the headquarters of hell on Earth.

Lemme give you a primer on the true meaning of Xmas. My parents sent me to Catholic schools, which was both a blessing and a curse. A blessing because I got a fairly damned good education. A curse because those doing the educating wore long robes, believed newborn infants had the stain of original sin on their souls, and had proudly forsworn sex. Ugh. I shudder to think of it.

Anyway, the nuns (who all wore wedding rings to signify their marriage to Jesus — yikes!) told us that we should chill our ardor for Xmas a little because it wasn’t even the top holiday of the Church. That would be Easter, the day their shared husband rose from the dead. Xmas, the day we celebrate Jesus’s birth, they said, should be marked quietly and in contemplation. Throwing a big bash and showering presents on each other was unseemly. Every mere mortal is born, they explained. What’s the big deal? Only Jesus, they concluded, rose from the dead. That’s the real deal.

And they were right! (If you believe in that kind of stuff, that is.) For centuries, devout Christians threw big bashes on Easter and pretty much glossed over Xmas. To celebrate Jesus’s birth was to emphasize his nature as a man; to celebrate his resurrection was to recognize his nature as god.

In fact, throughout Christian history, the actual birth of Jesus was even overshadowed by the Epiphany (the visit of the Magi to Bethlehem) and the Circumcision, (the celebration of which is so weird and unsettling that I can’t even think of a smart-assed joke to make about it.)

The celebration of Jesus’s birth came and went through the centuries. Each time it became somewhat institutionalized, some reform gang or another called for it to be outlawed, claiming it was disrespectful to the son of the guy who created the Universe. Their objections usually held sway — hell, who wants to piss off a guy with that much clout?

Even caroling, that ever-so wholesome family activity, had its origins in the packs of drunkards who caroused, singing, on the night of the Winter Solstice.

It wasn’t until 1890, when the department store had become the universal center for commerce, that Xmas-mania began to be established. That’s when Macy’s and Hudson’s and Sears began to go yule-crazy. Retailers wrapped up the traditional year-end, Solstice, pagan bacchanalia celebrations in a neat little package and sold it to customers as a homey, lovey-dovey, spiritual fete. The fact that empires created by the likes of Marshall Field and A. Montgomery Ward got more-than-healthy bumps to their bottom lines at year’s end was, well, y’know, just a coincidence.

So quit the bullshit about the true meaning of Xmas. It stands for nothing more than a vibrant consumer economy. Is that so wrong?

In fact, just writing this screed has made me rethink my position. I’m gonna put up a tree this year! Yup — and maybe, just maybe, The Loved One’ll put a new acoustic guitar under it for me. He he he!