Standing in the Crate & Barrel, staring at a delicate red, white, and green tear drop hanging from at delicate ribbon from my finger, I suddenly realized that this bit of glass was both enchanting and delicate, not in and of itself, but because of our need for it, our rush for it, in some cases, our obsession with it.
I'll be the first to scorn those who try to skip or join holidays. Thanskgiving and Halloween deserve their time. However, maybe there is something else going on. Perhaps there is a reason people rush.
When people say they love Christmas, what I think most people are referring to is actually the Christmas season. Or the Holiday season. And though this season can also typically be characterized by crazy consumerism, that consumerism -- or rather the means used to endorse it-- also causes a very enchanting atmosephere, one you are unlikely to find at any other time of the year.
While each holiday colors the streets and stores around us, none is quite as penetrating as that caused by the Winter Holidays.
Instead of just filling the night with lights meant to sell or direct, our streets are sparkled with color and quizzical arrangements of white bulbs. The town or city is turned into a festival of lights and decoration. It doesn't stop on our streets but proceeds indoors and dictates our food and sometimes even tackles our clothing and hair and makeup. Everyone begins taking appreciation in the things that would otherwise seem useless or meaningless, and though I know it is a stretching of the term, it is like everyone becomes their own artist.
We decorate, arrange, and adorn. And while we may not create all the delicate baubles, we certainly surround ourselves with them, expressing ourselves, even if narrowly.
The man that times his lights to music or the family that attracts traffic with their overly bright displays, take great care, effort, time, and perhaps pride in their displays. It is only curious to me what they could produce if they devoted their time to aesthetics at other times of the year.
Those who do not always sing, will catch up a carol or two, or even take to the streets, or break out in chorus at church or with family. Children are given crafts at home with a purpose, and the store front display no longer focuses only on highlighting product, but creating a scene, sometimes abandoning the advertising side completely and just painting snowmen or tumbling presents across the glass.
The cookies we make become shaped and decorative. Our cakes and pies suddenly deserve a bit of flourish or creative cut.
We color coordinate, cut and paste, and focus on adorning even ourselves with otherwise silly baubles and bells.
There remain the grinches and the scrooges and the plain uninterested souls who shy away, perhaps on principle, but the majority of the country gathers and creates. Whatever the holiday or their religious beliefs, if it is a major winter one, they more likely than not are sucked in.
In a society where it is constantly argued that art is for a select few and literature a laugh, it is constantly surprising to see how these two things truly saturate our lives. We appreciate aesthetic be it a building, a well put together outfit, a well trimmed hedge, or a funny binder. We drown ourselves in the literature of music, television, movies, magazine articles, and books then say we hated our English class.
And every so often we are invited to do it ourselves, even if it as simply as arranging an array of lights above our door or mantle or deciding to sprinkle this cookie red or green.
And perhaps, just perhaps, it is that freedom to create, adorn, and arrange unabashedly that we are so seldom offered that makes us rush into the holiday season, that makes us plan our Christmas tree before the taste of Halloween candy is washed from our mouths. Sure the holidays themselves offer a comforting feeling of tradition and family, but so do Easter and the 4th of July. Something else is happening here. The freedom, the expectation even, that everyone will participate opens the door. The normally crafty are ecstatic, and the often suppressed are joyful.
Perhaps we are a society starved for expression through art, and while decorating is perhaps not a complete substitute, it is a necessary one and the only one that many may ever feel comfortable pursuing. So much so, that we await the Holiday season with an unnatural eagerness.
It is art justified. Art encouraged. And we hunger for it.
A bit frivolous? Perhaps, but when you're starved, the smallest morsel can make all the difference.
I'll be the first to scorn those who try to skip or join holidays. Thanskgiving and Halloween deserve their time. However, maybe there is something else going on. Perhaps there is a reason people rush.
When people say they love Christmas, what I think most people are referring to is actually the Christmas season. Or the Holiday season. And though this season can also typically be characterized by crazy consumerism, that consumerism -- or rather the means used to endorse it-- also causes a very enchanting atmosephere, one you are unlikely to find at any other time of the year.
While each holiday colors the streets and stores around us, none is quite as penetrating as that caused by the Winter Holidays.
Instead of just filling the night with lights meant to sell or direct, our streets are sparkled with color and quizzical arrangements of white bulbs. The town or city is turned into a festival of lights and decoration. It doesn't stop on our streets but proceeds indoors and dictates our food and sometimes even tackles our clothing and hair and makeup. Everyone begins taking appreciation in the things that would otherwise seem useless or meaningless, and though I know it is a stretching of the term, it is like everyone becomes their own artist.
We decorate, arrange, and adorn. And while we may not create all the delicate baubles, we certainly surround ourselves with them, expressing ourselves, even if narrowly.
The man that times his lights to music or the family that attracts traffic with their overly bright displays, take great care, effort, time, and perhaps pride in their displays. It is only curious to me what they could produce if they devoted their time to aesthetics at other times of the year.
Those who do not always sing, will catch up a carol or two, or even take to the streets, or break out in chorus at church or with family. Children are given crafts at home with a purpose, and the store front display no longer focuses only on highlighting product, but creating a scene, sometimes abandoning the advertising side completely and just painting snowmen or tumbling presents across the glass.
The cookies we make become shaped and decorative. Our cakes and pies suddenly deserve a bit of flourish or creative cut.
We color coordinate, cut and paste, and focus on adorning even ourselves with otherwise silly baubles and bells.
There remain the grinches and the scrooges and the plain uninterested souls who shy away, perhaps on principle, but the majority of the country gathers and creates. Whatever the holiday or their religious beliefs, if it is a major winter one, they more likely than not are sucked in.
In a society where it is constantly argued that art is for a select few and literature a laugh, it is constantly surprising to see how these two things truly saturate our lives. We appreciate aesthetic be it a building, a well put together outfit, a well trimmed hedge, or a funny binder. We drown ourselves in the literature of music, television, movies, magazine articles, and books then say we hated our English class.
And every so often we are invited to do it ourselves, even if it as simply as arranging an array of lights above our door or mantle or deciding to sprinkle this cookie red or green.
And perhaps, just perhaps, it is that freedom to create, adorn, and arrange unabashedly that we are so seldom offered that makes us rush into the holiday season, that makes us plan our Christmas tree before the taste of Halloween candy is washed from our mouths. Sure the holidays themselves offer a comforting feeling of tradition and family, but so do Easter and the 4th of July. Something else is happening here. The freedom, the expectation even, that everyone will participate opens the door. The normally crafty are ecstatic, and the often suppressed are joyful.
Perhaps we are a society starved for expression through art, and while decorating is perhaps not a complete substitute, it is a necessary one and the only one that many may ever feel comfortable pursuing. So much so, that we await the Holiday season with an unnatural eagerness.
It is art justified. Art encouraged. And we hunger for it.
A bit frivolous? Perhaps, but when you're starved, the smallest morsel can make all the difference.
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