So this is Christmas…

Way back in 1996 I had my first experience of the ‘build up’, the intolerable heat and humidity Australia’s ‘top end’ experiences before the wet season.  My time in Darwin amounted to just two September weeks, but they were two weeks that convinced me that I was a cold climate man, and that was before I put on the pounds.

Maybe I’m just cynical (I was told I was unnecessarily cynical a few months back – I took it as a compliment), maybe I’m just getting old, but each year as we enter September, I get that ‘build up’ feeling back in my bones – and I hate it.

First, the supermarkets start with the candy canes and those gaudy cookie tins.  Then the department stores line the main aisles with Christmas trees (green ones, white ones, black ones, ones with lights instead of pine needles) and decorations.  Then they start on the Christmas carols over the in-store PA, the ads start on TV.  All the ads.  Buy this for Christmas, buy that for Christmas.

Then there is the planning for family Christmas celebrations.  The negotiations for how much to spend on each person, the wondering about which fringe family you need to buy for and who you can get away without.  My biggest problem Christmas shopping is looking at each potential present and working out all the ways the gift could possibly offend the recipient.  I then wonder whether that was subconsciously the reason I thought of the item and decide for that reason I should buy it.  Then I usually put it back on the shelf and mind-numbingly continue the search.

I’m proud to say that I’ve avoided resorting to gift-cards this year.  No doubt my carefully considered presents will be so far off the mark it isn’t funny and apart from Dad, no one will give them a second look.  I’ve always entertained the thought of giving my nephew a ‘goat for an African community’ card just to see if I get the same blank, somewhat disappointed response.

As I sit here now, I wonder what the Christmas Day arguments are going to be – police brutality, gay marriage, the pokie tax, some other tax, my mental health (or lack there of).  Will we play the traditional game of cricket or will we all be to old/fat/lazy/tired or all of the above.

Sitting on the shelf opposite me is a model train carriage I got for Christmas, I think, in 1986.  Perhaps I’d still enjoy Christmas if people gave me trains still…