Merry Christmas and happy holidays to all who celebrate during this most wonderful time of the year. I am looking forward to being with my family and sharing our traditions, but this year I’ve had to make some compromises.
My ancient GE gas range roasted its final turkey last Saturday as I put together a make-up Thanksgiving dinner because the family was hither and yon for the actual holiday. That was a marathon of cooking I do not advise a week before Christmas unless you’re doing Christmas early and not set to repeat it for another year.
I was wrung out the next day, but planned to cookie-cut ahead with all my yuletide treats because that’s what I do. I bake stuff to give away. It’s my magic. Besides is it actually Christmas if you don’t exhaust yourself?
I set the oven to preheat, and didn’t notice until I was ready to pop in the first sheet of crescent cookies that it was cold as snow in there.
Frantic dialing of knobs, curses, and stinging furious tears didn’t change the fact that it was a week before Christmas and I couldn’t bake.
I am not one to ever show up empty-handed. Throw any kind of gift-giving expectation on top of it – like Christmas – and the thought of having no token anything to offer my special friends and co-workers sent me into blank-eyed despair.
I was sidelined and benched in the game of giving where you can count on me in every way to deliver.
But not this year.
I gave up.
I stayed in my pajamas all day and binge-watched “The Witcher.” I took a long afternoon nap. For dinner, I meticulously picked out all the buttery seasoned Cheerios from of the last batch of homemade Chex Mix my oven will ever produce and ate them one by one.
I quietly, privately “rage quit” Christmas.
And by Sunday night, I was about as relaxed and rested as I have ever been going into the holiday week.
My 16-year-old kid often says to me, “Why do you have to always be doing something?”
Well, that’s just what I do.
But last weekend my busted stove gave me an unexpected gift. For all the quick breads and cookies, cinnamon rolls and quiches I ever whipped up and wrapped in bows, I received a much-needed break from all that.
My wish for you this season is that unexpected gifts find you, too. And that you have the wisdom to receive them.
Merry Christmas!
