It’s The Day After Christmas and the exhaustion of making Christmas magic is lingering like a bad cold. Especially when looking at the stack of dirty dishes despite doing several loads throughout Christmas day. Shipping boxes, packaging, wrapping paper and ribbons litter the room along with most of the gifts that haven’t found their permanent home yet. A stuffed refrigerator requires unloading half the shelf to find leftovers. An eclectic array of containers holding the last bits of delivered goodies lay scattered over the counters.
This familiar path to holiday exhaustion actually starts before Thanksgiving with cleaning and decorating and planning Thanksgiving dinner. Then it’s a slow march to Christmas, adding in shopping and wrapping, baking and delivering, cooking and cleaning and creating new memories until we finally arrive at Christmas day – and the final push with gifts, food and familiar family traditions.
Let’s take a step back for a moment. You realize, that a company like Disney spends billions each year and employs an army of people to create their brand of magic. It may look effortless when you visit, but creating that magic is a highly researched, financed and executed business with a lot of people behind the scenes.
I dust off my martyr complex and commiserate with myself about how much planning and effort and $$ it takes to create our magic holiday season. It feels good to wallow for a bit.
Thankfully, The Day After The Day After Christmas arrives. Exhaustion loosens its grip. The detritus of gifts find their permanent home and become wonderfully useful. Leftovers provide a welcome break from cooking and clean-up. Quiet moments allow for remembering the reason we celebrate Christmas. Memories surface: an adult child’s delight over an unexpected gift; a final sugar rush from treats that drop off the menu until next year, time to enjoy the lights, decorations, and music and perhaps even a few more cheesy Christmas movies without the distraction of a “still needs doing” list; grandchildren’s excitement as they explore their new toys, face-time videos with family. It all points to strengthening and renewing the relationships we hold dear. Holidays are prime time to bind hearts together.
So, the martyr surrenders. In its place, a deep feeling of gratitude for being able to celebrate every year with the people I love. I know I will do it again in 362 days thanks to The Day After the Day After Christmas.
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