Was Christmas As Stressful Back In The Day As It Is Now?

[Sam Gamgee]

I was thinking about this as I watched my wife (yet again) go through all the motions of decorating our home for Christmas very stressed. It all just seems like more work than enjoyment.

When I was a kid I remember my grandmother baking cookies with her Christmas apron on, carols on the player, and the house filled with the warmth of the season. Of course I was a kid and didn’t see it all correctly, but it looked like she was having a lot more fun than my wife and most everyone else I know these days.

It seems like life in general is more rushed and stressful than in decades past. I hate it.

We will get the house all dolled up and then when Christmas is over, there’s this huge sigh as we look at packing it all up and getting it back into the attic — again!

It all kind of ruins the season for me. I long to sit by the glow of the tree with a pint and a pipe and soak it all in. But it seems like those times never come. It’s all rush, rush, rush.

Anybody else relate to this?

 

[Kobold]

Yes I can totally relate. I had to get all of our Christmas decorations out of storage because we just moved to a smaller house and it just wasn’t as much fun decorating as it was in years past. I felt this weird feeling like I needed to rush and get everything up that very day when in reality I didn’t really need to at all.
It’s kind of sad that we have all these modern conveniences like instacart and Amazon to help of save time but we still feel rushed. Rushing puts me in a bad mood so lately I’ve been trying to take it easy and not rush but it’s tough.

 

[bobomatic]

I can relate. As a kid, it wasn't stressful at all. But as I grew up and had to pay to be Santa, then yeah, the stress would kick in. As my kids grew into adults, we all just finally agreed to stop buying gifts, stop stressing over decorations and just enjoy each others time together. It's few and far between when we're all under one roof, so now, that's our focus.

 

[daveinlax]

As I remember growing up in the seventies my mother and grandmother’s didn’t work outside the home.

 

[cosmicfolklore]

We've always had family dynamic stresses over the holidays, for as long as I remember. Dad would haul the tree inside and drop the decorations out of the attic. Mom would yell at us kids to get it decorated. Mom would burn something and dramatically toss it to the dogs in the back yard. Then there was the crazy drunk uncle who can't be in the same house as my other uncle, so the stresses of making sure they both weren't there at the same time. At least we didn't have to worry about gifts, because of our denomination, so only us kids got Santa Claus, and nothing was ever wrapped. It was mainly just a big dinner, everyone goes home, and :::sigh::: relief.

This year we aren't even decorating, and just a handful of gifts to worry with. Even then we have to balance when so and so will drop by because so and so won't be in the same room with them. Just thank God it will be over soon, and thankfully we don't recognize a birthday for the savior, as well as our own. My birthday is close to Christmas, and I am not a child anymore, so we just do a dinner on that night. In all honesty, I had been hoping that we wouldn't have to even acknowledge a Christmas holiday any more, except society seems to demand it these days. Sigh, I would much rather just have the kids over and watch a non-holiday movie with them all.
And, thank goodness I don't have to deal with jewelry repairs getting back to the stores in time for someone else to make a gift happen.
I'm just glad we don't have any grandkids to deal with :::knock on wood:::

Regardless we have neighbors asking us why we are so Bah humbug, and I have to explain that not all Christians acknowledge this as a holiday other than the fun Santa thing for children.

Mrs Cosmic and I will head out to the beach condo once the dinner is over with to ride out the rest of the year.

 

[Briar Lee]

My mother would sonetimes talk about the Christmas of 1941.

Her older brother Jiggs was 18 years old and the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor and his mother cried all Christmas, afraid it would be her last one with her boy.

Our problems and stresses are not new.

Jiggs died an old, old man, and outlived his mother over two decades, but they didn’t know that would be the case on Christmas 1941.

 

[Sam Gamgee]

As I remember growing up in the seventies my mother and grandmother’s didn’t work outside the home.

Neither does my wife. But all the stress remains.

 

[El Capitán]

We all help put up decorations in the house. Nothing stressful here except the rush to the pie table.

 

[daveinlax]

Neither does my wife. But all the stress remains.

Yeah! Until we retired all we knew was fitting the holidays into a 50+ hour work week. Holiday air travel is the only stress these days. I put my foot down last year on staying home after we involved in the Southwest debacle but what do you know Mrslax forgot that and we'll be in the air again over the holidays.

 

[Sigmund]

Holidays are designed to make you thankful.

Thankful the they are not every day!

 

[scloyd]

My job is bring all of the decorations down from the attic. My wife does all the decorating. When she's done, I haul all of the empty totes/bins back up to the attic. New Years Day I bring down the bins, she packs it all away, I carry the bins back up to the attic. I hate every minute of it.

If my wife passes before me, I will get the largest dumpster available and clean out the attic.

My wife enjoys the holidays, that's all that really matters. I bite my lip.

 

[Sigmund]

3 weeks gentlemen, 3 weeks.

 

[HawkeyeLinus]

Well, you can't have a pint by the fire and enjoy tree unless someone puts it up!

With our nest empty we have, over time, reduced the amount of what we put out in the house and I think we have it reduced to a pattern of essentials (hilariously, my wife told me the other day that last year right after Christmas she took pictures of various rooms to see what we had done just in case this year I said, "no, this or that wasn't out last year" or "we never put that out anymore", lol).

Because I was under the weather, we didn't get the tree up right after Thanksgiving, but it will go up tomorrow and will be decorated Sunday - lots of artificial branch straightening! There may be a few little things we haven't put out that may be in boxes with ornaments, she knows where that stuff is. Otherwise, yep, some special things and holiday photos of the kids over the years, change of tablecloths and that's what we do.

Biggest change is I just don't fool around lighting the outside of the house anymore - it was something the kids always wanted and so of course, it was done. Now just a wreath on the front door.

Stress related to decorating? Nah. I like putting stuff out, looking though the tubs, we don't do it in a hurry, never have. Decorating the tree was always a family activity with cookies, etc. and I miss that, but kids grow up!

Stress related to the season? Nah, I love it. Always been a big holiday in our house, my wife's family, my parents' families and their parents' families whether modest or "more", and always with the core meaning for context.

For me the whole season is sort of a break from the ordinary stresses and helps manage some of them - and I've always taken time off just before and especially after Christmas - great time to relax, even if it meant helping put together this or that for Barbie, assembling whatever, wearing a tiara playing the Disney Princess game, you name it.

Maybe it's time for "Honey, we need to rediscover the magic of the season - where do we start?"

 

[Gimlet]

It's only stressful if you let it. Turn off the TV ads, ignore the commercial hype and just concentrate on you and yours.

Edit: should have added, stay out of the big stores and shopping malls as well. Nothing brings out my inner Scrooge like the assault on the sense of all in-store kitsch and tat and the piped jingle bells. Shop mindfully, shop quiet, shop local.

 

[ThermionicScott]

If you go "back in the day" far enough, people didn't really even celebrate Christmas. IIRC, Christmas celebrations were protested and banned at various points of history, and by Christian groups like the Puritans! But I'm sure they had plenty of other things to be stressed about, it's easy to complain about modern issues and romanticize the past, forgetting about all the things that were horrible back then.

But anyways, it does seem like the expectations for house decorations, food, gatherings, gifts, etc get more and more out of control every year. The touchy-feely "self-care" crowd has the right idea: learn how to say "no", and to "hold your boundaries". Just do the amount of Christmas BS that you want to, and tell whiners to pound sand. You'll be happier!

 

[HawkeyeLinus]

My job is bring all of the decorations down from the attic. My wife does all the decorating. When she's done, I haul all of the empty totes/bins back up to the attic. New Years Day I bring down the bins, she packs it all away, I carry the bins back up to the attic. I hate every minute of it.

If my wife passes before me, I will get the largest dumpster available and clean out the attic.

My wife enjoys the holidays, that's all that really matters. I bite my lip.

LOL, the Super Bowl was always our reminder it was time to take down the Christmas decorations and the tree (unless we'd had a real one). My wife loves having the tree on and always felt she enjoyed it more after Christmas and the kids liked having it on in the evenings and keeping it up. With the Super Bowl getting later, we get things down earlier these days, haha, but still up until mid-January.

My parents were always the same as you - New Years Day or New Years Eve depending on the day of the week was put away Christmas day and that was always fine by me, and I remember helping my wife's mom put their Xmas stuff away one New Years Day. I've grown to enjoy having the stuff out longer as well, especially all the holiday photos of the kids over the years that are literally everywhere. Or maybe, I'm just lazy . . . . . .

 

[bullet08]

That's what happens when all the elves retire and humans are end up with decorating the damned house and the freaking tree. But that's why I have two sons.

 

[daveinlax]

Back in Wisconsin we had a real tree and 20 totes of Christmas stuff to hump up from the davecave. I prefer my SoAz snow bird Christmas with a beautiful fake tree and the 3 zip-loc bags of cigar tubes I hang on it.

 

[EchoPlex]

I feel ya, OP. If anything, shopping is massively easier and less stressful for us, but at the massive expense of Christmas spirit. All gifts are ordered online, except whiskey and wine. No more malls or shops, or carolers or tops. Cards and photos are sent with a click. No standing in line for pic with Saint Nick. ok ok, I'll stop... But seriously, I feel like fuckin' Scrooge McDuck here, trying to save every last penny on some thoughtless online deal. Pre-sales, free shipping, coupon codes, tracking, porch pirates... I hate it.

By the end of the decade, drones will be buzzing Christmas presents from porch to porch, and the extinct malls will be filled with quantum AI computers. I miss the 20th century dearly. Christmas was so kick-ass back then, and many of us who grew up in the previous century/millenium have the burden of knowing how kick-ass it was. My 21st c. kids don't know the difference, thank God. They're Christmases are kick-ass to them, and that's all that really matters. But soon enough, quantum AI will be doing it all - It will know what perfect gift to get everyone for Christmas based on our online history and Facebook accounts. It will stand in digital line for us on Black Friday to squeeze every last cent of a discount. It will wrap that perfect gift and send a drone to a familly's doorstep to deliver another brown box joy. And there will be no returns, because quantum Santa will be *chef's kiss* perfection...

Can you imagine putting even less thought into Christmas than now? What a tragedy. Or as my kids will say, "How wonderfully efficient, cheap, and easy!" "Five stars out of Five".

 

[Chasing Embers]

Just another day. Other than gift giving, many locally don't bother with decorating anymore. I think I've only seen one home with lights this year. If it's causing stress it's really missing the point or you're trying too hard to compete with others.