Maybe It’s Time to Let Christmas Linger

 I said, in December of 2014, as my husband and I were undecorating our house after it took weeks to get just so, as we were wrapping up Santas and Christmas plates, labeling snowmen and angels, packing away the creche, looking once again at all the photo cards I can't ever throw away, cards I store in a giant box in a closet and resurrect every December, that we should keep up the Christmas decorations all year long. Why not? They're bright and colorful. The tree is artificial. The garland is, too. Glitter and gold work for every holiday, and the manger has meaning every day. Besides, not decorating and undecorating year after year would save so much time!

But I am a victim of social pressure, so last season, as every Christmas season, I dutifully took down all the greens, packed up all the Santas, and vacuumed up all the glitter. And at the end of a long day, maybe two, the house looked clean and neat.

But bare. Echoey, starkly bare. Just as it does again this season.

The problem is, Christmas is over too fast. The parties. The cooking and shopping and eating too much. The good will. Reaching out to family and friends, writing cards, not just e-mails. Visiting.

It's over now. This out-of-control holiday that bolts out of the gate before Labor Day, that consumes us for months, that gets us crazy, is always over in a few hours, at most a few days. It's like hitting a brick wall at 60 miles per hour.

Years ago, a priest friend told me that Christmas shouldn't end like this, that the season doesn't even begin until Christmas Day and that from Dec. 25 through Jan. 6 are the actual 12 days of Christmas we all sing about.

But nobody is singing Christmas songs in January, except in church, except for a few hymns. For many of us, Christmas is Cinderella, and Jan. 1 is the midnight that takes all the magic away. Be gone the presents under the tree! Be gone the tree! Be gone the Santas on the lawns and reindeer on the roofs and all the sparkling lights. Be gone, everything, except some wreaths on some doors and a few candles in a few windows.

Christmas can't linger forever, I know. If Cinderella ran off to a ball and wore glass slippers every night she'd have bunions on her feet and bags under her eyes.

But why, every year, are we in such a rush to break the spell, to slam the door shut on a holiday for which we prepare for months? What would be the harm of keeping up the Christmas decorations a little while longer? Sipping a little more eggnog. Spending a little more time with friends.

January storms into the world like a dictator, insisting upon order and diet and self-improvement in all its many forms, RIGHT THIS MINUTE! "It's time to get in shape. It's time to be organized. It's time to stop procrastinating, to be the best you can be." January shouts, "No more junk food. No more impulse-buying. No more burning the candle at both ends." January declares the party over.

And it is. Kids go back to school. Parents go back to work. And all the frivolity and fun that make up Christmas are over in a blink.

Why can't Christmas trail out the way it trailed in, a little at a time? Why not keep the Christmas lights burning during January's dark days? Why not send a photo card with an "I've been thinking of you" to a friend? Why not keep a few Santas around and play Jenga and Scrabble and Spit because they're fun?

Where are we rushing to that is so important? February? March?

April, maybe. But until then we really do need some leftover Christmas to get us through.