“I’m putting out the tree, and I don’t care,” said my co-worker.
He was referring to his little office Christmas tree. He reached up into a cabinet and extracted the ornament. Bam! It was Christmas.
At the St. Johns Town Center in Jacksonville, Christmas music was already playing from the speakers. The sky was sunny, people wore shorts and there was Andy Williams telling us, “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year.”
I don’t need to tell you there have been singing Christmas trees, lights and snowmen sledding out on store shelves since, I don’t know, July? Stores always get in on the act early. Forget Halloween. Forget Thanksgiving — “Turkeys? Who needs stinkin’ Turkeys?” We’re moving on.
It’s Christmas time, baby!
Part of me is ready for it. The part that loves sweaters and presents and dressing the dog up like some wild deranged holiday beast. (“She looks like a rabid reindeer!” people complain.)
But another part wants to know why all the rush. Or more importantly, doesn’t want to rush. Doesn’t want to race into anything. Doesn’t want it to come too fast, because then it goes away too fast, and then it’s all over. In the blink of an eye.
Something awful happened this Halloween: We forgot to carve the pumpkin.
Let me repeat that: WE … FORGOT … TO … CARVE … THE … PUMPKIN!
What kind of people are we? On the way to a friend’s house for trick or treating my daughter gasped. She had just realized our major holiday faux pas. We had bought pumpkins. We had painted pumpkins. We had deposited them all over the house, including a big one on the front porch. And we were waiting until the last moment to carve the big guy so the brutal western setting sun wouldn’t turn him to mush.
And then we forgot to do it.
“Turn around,” she cried to my wife. “We have to go back!”
It was too late. It was over. We’re moving on.
It’s now going to be a Thanksgiving pumpkin. We’re going to dress him up as a Pilgrim or a farmer or a turkey Pilgrim farmer. Some such thing. He gets to live another day — two holidays in one. That’s kind of cool.
But with my daughter turning eight this Christmas, I wonder how many years of pumpkin carving we have left? And we missed one. Total whiff!
That’s why I don’t want Christmas to get here any sooner. Take your time. Stop along the way. Get some tea. Have a conversation with the neighbors. Let us set out the table and get through Thanksgiving first. Let us savor it.
Yes, savor it. Take it in. Enjoy it, while it lasts. Because the quicker it comes, the quicker it goes. And like carving that pumpkin, there’s no getting it back.