Stillness -- Oil on Canvas: 12x24

The other day my wife was setting up an informal get together with friends to knit for an evening when one of the women commented, "Do you think it will be all right to do this the week before Christmas? I mean, won't it just add to all the stress?"

My wife said that two things blurted out of her mouth nearly simultaneously: One, "Knitting is stressful?" and Two, "What are people getting so stressed about the week before Christmas?"

As I don't knit, I don't know about the knitting being stressful part, although my wife looks like a contented cat when she's doing it, but I am as frustrated as she is about the Christmas tension and trauma situation.

Just how, as a society, did we get to the point of taking such a happy, fun holiday and turning it into a series of assignments and deadlines that need to be slogged through? If Christmas cards are so expensive and time consuming, why do people send them (many of the ones we receive are simply signed with no message, or whatever message is included is one of those laughably wretched year-encapsulating  brag sheets that make everyone reading them feel inferior about their own lives).

If purchasing presents is stealing from the grocery fund, then why the guilt feelings about forgoing purchasing or scaling down -- especially when the gifts are for acquaintances, distant distant relatives, or co-workers and associates? Are all of the parties truly necessary? And the children's plays and choral concerts that the participants so diligently complain about and the parents so stoically sit through -- will society collapse if we collectively say "no" to them this year?

Lest I be called a Grinch, allow me to point out that none of these societal obligations has anything to do with Christmas, or the meaning of Christmas, or the reason behind Christmas, or the spirt of Christmas -- but rather, they are a series of non-spoken obligatons that we impose upon ourselves and others, and, when they reach the point of not being fun, then they have outlived whatever usefulness that they had.

Giving and receiving gifts, sending cards, attending parties, listening to concerts and plays -- all of these are fine as long as they remain meaningful and do not detract from their value by adding to a sense of overwork and obligation. I have always likened activities to the offeirngs available at a potluck -- there's a lot of incredibly delicious food on those tables, but each plate can only hold so much. If we overload ourselves, then we either wind up getting sick from overeating or wasting what we can't consume.

In the long run, wouldn't it be better to step back a few feet and choose a half-portion each of two desserts?

I wish for all of you a sense of stillness and peace in this season of grace.

Original oil painting by Steve Henderson of Steve Henderson Fine Art