Who needs “New Year’s Eve” when you can have the Feast of Pope St. Sylvester instead?!

It may be a little too late in the month to celebrate the horrific mutilation of St. Lucy with blue cheese and gingersnaps, but at least you’ll have a more accurate image of St. Nicholas in time for Christmas. (You can even leave him some extra cookies to thank him for resurrecting those pickled babies!)

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In an essay at Role/Reboot, she explains why she’s tempted to do just that.

If that seems harsh, keep in mind that her family’s Christmas traditions include a puppet show in which a Mr. Donkey delivers a reason-for-the-season lecture to a Mrs. Flapjaws—so named “because, like most women, she had a hard time keeping her mouth shut,” which seems kind of unfair given that Flapjaws is her married name.

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***

In my first Christmas memory, I am holding a child-sized pink broom.  I am only two, so it was still too early to guess what kind of adult I would grow up to be: someone known to leave glitter all over the kitchen floor at 3AM, hoping the dog won’t roll around in it before I can get to it in the morning. But in this memory, I am excited about a broom because it means I get to clean the floor with my mom, one of the most exciting things that can be asked of you when you are a little girl who is mildly obsessive compulsive.  Other acceptable gifts would have included a bottle of Windex or a toilet brush.

I shake the broom in one tight fist and open a second present with the other.  This next gift is big, and I am secretly hoping for a Power Wheels, something I would later realize Santa only brought to lucky rich kids, along with stock in Apple and dental insurance.

“What is it?” my dad says. I tear open the paper.

It is a bear. A large brown bear exactly my size.

“It’s a new bear!” says my mom.

“New Bear,” I say, giving him the most creative name I can muster. “New Bear!”

That is the happiest I have ever been on Christmas morning: a new brand new person getting a brand new bear, brain smoking with optimism and possibility.  I became the kid who counted down the days until Christmas, making a carefully itemized list of presents that was both easy for Santa to read and didn’t seem too greedy, along with a separate list of good deeds I had done, which I kept in my room, in the event that proof should be required of me that I had, in fact, been good.  When Christmas Day finally came, I was the kid who was up at six in the morning, running down the stairs to survey the presents under the tree, jumping around like a guy on acid at a Butthole Surfers concert until my sister woke up, usually six or seven hours later.  And when the gifts were all opened and my family laid around the television like a group of sealions, I would be the one to laugh at Ralphie’s plight for a Red Rider BB gun every time as though it were the first.

I can trace it all back to that moment with my parents and New Bear and the pink broom.  That’s when I fell in love with Christmas: the lights, the hope, the mysteriously eaten cookies.  This love gave forth an unwavering loyalty to Santa that was almost unbearable.  I never questioned that our chimney lead straight into an oil burner in the basement.  I turned a blind ear when my fifth grade teacher sarcastically blurted out, “That’s like believing in Santa!”

“She’s joking, and none of this is even happening,” I remember thinking, pushing it into the shadowly corners of my mind reserved for adult truths I didn’t need to know, like when I told Carly she was adopted and she started to cry, so my mom said that she remembered the day she was conceived.

“I knew if I didn’t roll over, I was just gonna get pregnant again,” she had said, ashing out the window of our 1986 Buick Regal.  Carly stopped crying and we both stared at her in stunned silence. “And here you are!”

I became the Eva Braun of the holiday spirit, willing to follow Santa into a dark bunker of perpetually suspended disbelief for as long as it took to stay a child forever.  And somehow, in my tireless pursuit of make-believe, nobody ever actually broke the news to me. I had to learn for myself on the Christmas morning where the only gift I received from my beloved Santa Claus was a package of high-waisted mauve underwear which I had been present for the purchase of.  Every other gift- the puppy sweater, the sled, the toy ponies- were labeled, “Love Mom & Artie.”  I looked at the chaotic sea of wrapping paper, then at my family, alone in their narcissistic pleasure-domes of materialism.  I felt cold, empty, abandoned and I ran upstairs to my room.  My mother eventually noticed my absence and followed the trail of chocolate marshmallow Santa wrappers to where I was.

When the door slowly opened, my mother found me in a hysterical fit, crouched between a poster of a unicorn and one of wild horses running at a speed so fast, they blurred slightly, adding drama and intrigue to the photograph.  I looked up, snotting onto the sleeve of my pajamas.

“Just because Carly doesn’t believe in Santa Claus doesn’t mean that I don’t!” I sobbed, clutching New Bear.

My mother, bless her stony heart, was unprepared to deal with a child who had based her entire life around one magical fat man’s yearly journey to deliver gifts to every child in the world in a single action-packed night. So, she did the only thing a mother really can do. She sighed and walked out.

I was fourteen.

I was jaded for a long time.  Bitter, some might say.  I felt the way I imagine someone might have felt when DLR left Van Halen.  Angry, deceived, alone.  My family reacted the way most families do when one suffers a deep, inconsolable personal tragedy: by ignoring it completely, never bringing it up again, and pretending it never happened.  I hoped I would one day have the courage to heal, so I put New Bear in the attic.  I just couldn’t bear to look him in his innocent plastic eyes and tell him we’d been had.

My parents began to cope in other ways, mostly by combing the clearance section of our local Walmart and slowly filling the house with robots.

“Look!” said my mother, after returning home with a cart of economically-priced Christmas promise. “His name is Yule Burner! Isn’t that funny?” She placed the talking log in the cardboard fireplace that we only bring out on special occasions.  There are several back-up cardboard fireplaces, in case they are discontinued, or in the event that a flash flood takes out Fireplaces One though Five.  Life is uncertain, and we are prepared.

It’s a longstanding tradition in my family that everything possible is artificial, with added bonus points if it can be taken apart and stored in the attic.  Every year, a week before Christmas, my stepfather assembles the big fake tree we have had since the early 80s.  This tree has been through five presidential administrations without so much as shedding a single needle.  Usually, several arguments break out during the assembly process, mostly due to decreased levels of dopamine, which is leached out merely by touching the aluminum branches.  These branches are labeled with color-coded stickers in varying shades of green and brown, and Artie, my stepdad, though slightly colorblind, is nothing if not a trooper.  It takes several hours to put together, but it eventually gets done.

My mother is delegated the responsibility of untangling the strings of lights, which mate in the offs-season and become knotted together in a web of electrical fornication.  My parents used to chainsmoke to keep from killing each other during this process, and the house would start to resemble a fire department training site.  Carly and I looked for each other in the haze, banding together in the inferno to hang ornaments.

We used to try to hide the embarrassing ones we made in Girl Scouts towards the back of the tree. Mine, made of beads pinned onto a Styrofoam star, is slightly less pathetic than Carly’s, which is a circle of looseleaf paper with strings of orange and brown yarn fastened to it with a substance that was either paste or her own boogers. The calculating steps we made to preserve our dignity were thwarted when my parents bought a Tree Spinner, which ensures that all ornaments are displayed equally.  When I left home, my mother started decorating the tree alone, glad nobody is in her way when she’s unraveling the lights or complaining that we have to watch Law and Order.  When nobody is around, she fingers our small, retarded ornaments, wondering what will become of us.

For as long as I can remember, the big Christmas Eve party has been at our house.  My mom has it catered by Ground Round, a restaurant that had its heyday in 1975 and has been in a steady decline since then.  There is only one left on Long Island when I am sure there used to be hundreds.  This Ground Round that provides my family with a 6-foot hero, chicken fingers, and ziti is the last holdout of its kind, the only surviving buffalo, the lone Piping Plover nesting on the beach.  And my extended family, all of my cousins and their screaming children, my weird bachelor uncles we only see once a year and the rest of the time fear they are dead, my 78-year old Aunt Dolores who has given the gift of a giant Hersey Kiss to every member of our family for the last thirty-five years, they all gather at our house one day a year, because we are a family, and because there is an unlimited free meal.  It’s like going to the Sizzler and finding out that everyone there is your cousin.

My mother goes to great pains to clean the house for this event, lest our relatives know what slobs we are the other 364 days of the year.  She puts fresh batteries in Dancing Santa, Singing Skiing Santa, Dancing Reindeer Who Also Sings, Elmo Dressed like Santa Who Does the Electric Slide, Singing Wreath Whose Eyes Flutter Open Like Jason Voorhees Just When You Think He’s Dead, Yule Burner the Talking Fireplace Log, Small Singing Tree That Will Eventually Give My Stepfather Another Heart Attack, and all their caroling, soft-shoe-ing, hip-swaying pals.  She is awake for days, manically scrubbing, vacuuming, and plugging in animatronic animals.  And just when I thought it couldn’t become more of a powder keg of Christmas cheer,  my mom found a Santa suit on clearance.

When I was a child, I never would have imagined Artie donning a red fur suit and synthetic white beard.  This seemed to me like something that only happened in wholesome TV families or on episodes of America’s Most Wanted where John Walsh is begging America to catch the bastard.  Not in my family, I thought. No, sir.  I would never have imagined Artie agreeing to this, much less straight-up owning it.  On Christmas Eve, when all of my extended family is conveniently gathered in the dining room, the doorbell rings.  My mother answers, playing the role of bewildered homeowner with the same drama and poise as I imagine Joan Crawford would have in her later years.  Artie stands in the doorway, always manages to say something gross about my mom being a “good little girl” and enters our house.  He gasps.  He wasn’t expecting so many children, but Artie is prepared.  He has a pillowcase of weird crap my mom bought at the Dollar Tree and stayed up all night wrapping.  He hands out gifts to every relative and warns the children they should get to bed soon or he might accidentally fly over their house.  He holds a few babies, takes a couple pictures, and he’s gone into the darkness, around the house and into the basement to transform back into plain old Artie, the fifty year-old union man we all know and love.

There have been several years where I have missed Christmas at my mom’s house, missed the oversized Hershey Kisses, the frantic scramble of a generation of kids I barely know knocking over battery-operated snowmen to get to the next present, my mom redressing naked reindeer and cursing just low enough not to hear.  In my own house, there is not a single animatronic Santa, but I will always live with the fear that there will be a set of eyes lighting up and screaming Auld Lang Syne at me through the darkness when I get up to pee on any given night in December.  I will never have children, but if I did, I would raise them to love Santa, to trust in him, to put their holiday wishes in his white-gloved hand.  And if they don’t stop believing by high school, it’s tradition to be scarred on Christmas.

***

Title from the Waitresses’ song, “Christmas Wrapping.”

Illustrations by the author.

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Every year I try to convince my sister not to celebrate Christmas. I tell her we’re not Christians. She says I’m wrapping the children’s presents wrong. I tell her the kids will tear the paper anyway. She tells me to please be quiet and keep working.

My family has always had a love/hate relationship with Christmas. My sisters love it, I hate it.

My family is Druze, not Christian. We were raised in a tradition that is not supposed to have silly manifestations of faith. The only feast we celebrate is Adha, Abraham’s sacrifice. We don’t have a food orgy at the end of Ramadan, we don’t flagellate ourselves during Ashura, and for Christmas, we certainly don’t shower our children in gold, frankincense, and Dolce & Gabbana.

My father never wanted to celebrate Christmas. My mother did. She still does. Every year she decorates her tree with only red ornaments. As she puts up the tree, she tells me that she feels terribly guilty now that my father has passed away since he disliked Christmas so much.

Though she’s a Lebanese Druze from the mountain, just like my father, she was born in Jerusalem where my grandparents were living. Her mother placed my mother and her sisters in a Catholic school. She didn’t want her daughters to grow up to be Lebanese Druze from the mountain, but wanted them to become sophisticated and debonair. When the nuns asked my grandmother if her family was Christian, she said, “Mais, bien sûr.”

My father may have loved his French wine, his single-malt scotch; he may have adored his four-ply cashmere sweater, his Lanvin tie; he may have enjoyed his foray to Paris, and the memorable dinner at a small bistro in Geneva. But in his heart of hearts, he really and truly wanted to remain a Lebanese Druze from the mountain, just like his father.

For the children, my mother would say. She put up a Christmas tree, with presents underneath for the children, every year for the forty-five years they were together. The compromise was that the tree would be simple and classy, not ostentatious, not decadent, only red ornaments. My father would curse when we sang Christmas carols. He would grumble as he helped open the presents he bought us.

My family now puts up more than one Christmas tree. My two sisters each decorate a tree—for the children, of course—and my mother has one, for when the grandchildren come to visit. Every year.

My mother’s tree has remained simple, but not my sister’s. My sister always wants to have the best tree in all of Beirut. Sometime in late November, my sister’s home is transformed into a holiday monster. She has a collection of at least two-dozen Santa Claus dolls. She has a life-size red reindeer. She puts lights on not just the tree, but on every plant in the apartment—including the cacti. She covers every object in sight with a bowed red ribbon so that it looks like a present, and she buys a present for every child she’s ever met.

She drives me crazy. I tell her we’re not Christians. She says Christmas has nothing to do with Christianity. I tell her Christmas is a celebration of the birth of Christ. She asks, “Who?”

She doesn’t stop at Christmas. Of course, she cooks lamb for Adha. She hides painted eggs for the children on Easter. She has an orgiastic dinner for all her friends at the end of Ramadan. This year, she cooked a giant turkey for American Thanksgiving—except she did it on a Friday. She couldn’t have a big dinner in the middle of the week, she said. It’s impractical.

I told her she’s not American. She told me to stop being a Lebanese peasant from the mountain.

Every year, I complain and try to convince her not to celebrate Christmas. She tells me I am wrapping the children’s presents all wrong. I tell her that it’s pointless since the kids will tear through the paper anyway. She tells me to please be quiet and keep working.

I grumble and mumble—sometimes to myself, sometimes loudly—whenever I come across a delightfully decorated tree.

Every year, I try to be at each of my sisters’ homes when the children open their presents. I grumble and curse as the children squeal in delight.

Every year, as I gingerly try to remove my father’s noose from around my neck, it is with my own hands that I nearly strangle myself.

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Monday 12/20: Joint Food Not Bombs in Union Square for a Sit/Eat against Sit/Lie. Eaters will meet outside Macy’s Union Square to protest the recently passed Prop. L in the middle of downtown San Francisco during the most crowded shopping season of the year.  Free, 4-6pm @ Geary & Powell Streets.

Tuesday 12/21: Get yourself to Amnesia for Sum Kind of Trouble, the weekly variety open mike hosted by Rajeev Dhar.  Musicians, authors, and comedians take the stage each week, along with special guests to keep the open mic format interesting.  It’s free, and you never know who will end up performing, including yourself.  21+, 6:30-9pm @ 853 Valencia Street.

Wednesday 12/22: Another holiday Bazaar!  Real Mercantile has been holding weekly craft markets all month — join them for the last one of the year to finish up your last minute anti-department store holiday shopping while you sip on mulled wine at Chez Poulet.  Free, 5-9pm @ 3359 Ceasar Chavez Street.

Thursday 12/23: Today marks the anniversary of quirky post-impressionist Vincent Van Gogh’s holiday gift of his own ear to his favorite prostitute!  Celebrate with a trip to the De Young Museum for a look at Post-Impressionist Masterpieces from the Musée D’Orsay. Following this year’s earlier exhibit of Impressionist work’s from the Musée D’Orsay, the Post-Impressionist collection includes infamous works by Van Gogh as well as Cezanne, Toulouse-Lautrec, Gauguin, and others.  Tickets $15-25, 9:30am-5pm @ 50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Drive.

Friday 12/24: Get into the holiday spirit or celebrate your inner Scrooge with the American Conservatory Theater’s last performance of A Christmas Carol. Tickets $25+, 2pm matinee/7pm evening show @ 415 Geary Street.

Saturday 12/25: Regardless of your faith or lack thereof, help others this Christmas by volunteering your time to the distribution of dinner and gifts to needy families.  City Impact welcomes any volunteer on a first-come/first-served basis to their Christmas Block Party. Prep, serve, or run to help them reach their goal of delivering 5,000 meals, passing out 1,000 bags of groceries, and giving away 1,200 toys.  8:30am-3pm @ 230 Jones Street.

Sunday 12/26: Host (and fabulous musician), Bryant Denison, brings another open mic to San Francisco’s artistic melting pot known as The Mission with the Free Speech Zone at Kaleidoscope. 8-11pm @ 3109 24th Street.

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“A Visit from Saint Nicholas in the Ernest Hemingway Manner” by James Thurber, who also has strong feelings concerning Christmas cards.

Our own editor-in-chief Stephen Elliott remembers Christmas: “No Home I’d Call My Own.”

Rumpus contributor Michelle Threadgould on “Holiday Burlesque: The No Santa Baby Rule and The Art of the Tease.”

“Christmas poem to a man in jail” by Charles Bukowski.

Rumpus New York editor Rozalia Jovanovic‘s short fiction: “The Trouble with the Eve” and “Frames.”

Moby Dick as a snow sculpture and books as a Christmas tree.

The New York Public Library on William S. Burroughs’ Christmas cards and letters: “A Burroughs Christmas Story.” (via Maud Newtwon)

Don’t miss our holiday cartoons: Paul Madonna‘s “SMALL POTATOES: Holiday Theatre” and Jon Adams‘ “TRUTH SERUM: Merry Crimmis.”

Lastly, please consider making a donation, or better yet, sign up for the $3 a month subscription. Keep The Rumpus alive.

Happy Holidays!

-The Rumpus Staff

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A handy Christmas facts info-graphic for you.

Scienceray wants to talk to you about the Trogon family of birds. I link to this begrudgingly because birds are terrifying.

I’ve got a pretty unhealthy time fixation, also I love the Big Picture which makes this year in review pretty hard to pass up.

Nabokov’s book covers as butterfly collection.

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The Mexican answers some important questions about faith and cartoons.

Yes yes yes. Take what Overthinking It says about filmmaking and apply it to writers as well. Everyone needs an editor.

Wonder Woman + bondage

Card-counters, the Indiana Court of Appeals says you’re welcome. The casinos are not happy about this.

So I guess being a professional mascot in the NFL just doesn’t bring the ladies running, huh?

This item is heinous even by Regretsy’s standards. Maybe not safe for work–depends on your company’s policy on visible pubes.

These may all be interesting options for your Christmas viewing, but do any of them bring it like Run DMC?

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