'Tisn't really the season
Twelve days until Christmas and all I want is to move the whole shebang to the middle of August. "Christmas in July" is a tired old sale slogan, but a summer Christmas would be much more practical in Texas than the year-end version we inherited.
I know Christmas got tacked onto those old European winter festivals like Saturnalia and Yule, and that's great. Nothing better to do in the middle of a dark, cold season but have a party and light some stuff on fire. Takes the mind off the bleakness and such.
But here in Austin, I spent the afternoon in a tank top and sunglasses, shoveling fill dirt into dog-made holes and transplanting still-green tender perennials. I try not to resent Christmas -- although I heartily resent the accompanying mass-merch frenzy -- but it does gall me to spend time prepping for a dead-o'-winter pick-me-up during the perfect time of year to plant trees and prep garden beds for spring veggies. It would make so much more sense to have a big party in August, when the weather keeps everyone indoors and nature is more or less dormant. That's the time to distract the kids with decorations and presents and sweets.
Right now I'd rather be gardening. I wouldn't even let my poor family have a normal plastic or dying tree. Ours is a live blue spruce in a 15-gallon pot (cleverly and decoratively concealed by a bedsheet) that will, if the weather holds, go from the living room to the front yard on the morning of December 26. Maybe next year we won't have a tree at all but a cold frame full of cole-crop seedlings almost ready to transplant, and the weirdest August 25th on the block.
I know Christmas got tacked onto those old European winter festivals like Saturnalia and Yule, and that's great. Nothing better to do in the middle of a dark, cold season but have a party and light some stuff on fire. Takes the mind off the bleakness and such.
But here in Austin, I spent the afternoon in a tank top and sunglasses, shoveling fill dirt into dog-made holes and transplanting still-green tender perennials. I try not to resent Christmas -- although I heartily resent the accompanying mass-merch frenzy -- but it does gall me to spend time prepping for a dead-o'-winter pick-me-up during the perfect time of year to plant trees and prep garden beds for spring veggies. It would make so much more sense to have a big party in August, when the weather keeps everyone indoors and nature is more or less dormant. That's the time to distract the kids with decorations and presents and sweets.
Right now I'd rather be gardening. I wouldn't even let my poor family have a normal plastic or dying tree. Ours is a live blue spruce in a 15-gallon pot (cleverly and decoratively concealed by a bedsheet) that will, if the weather holds, go from the living room to the front yard on the morning of December 26. Maybe next year we won't have a tree at all but a cold frame full of cole-crop seedlings almost ready to transplant, and the weirdest August 25th on the block.
Labels: crackpot notions
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