I don’t have seasonal affective disorder. I actually experience the reverse, my mood becoming measurably better when it’s darker and colder outside and worse when it gets warm and bright.

But something happens to Christmas as you grow up, and it’s something that made the holidays difficult for roughly the last ten years. Both the spiritual and the secular sides suffered. In fact, it’s only just this year that I kind of got back into the spirit. I put up most of the Christmas decorations at home. At work, I’m decorating my cubicle in a Nightmare Before Christmas theme, which was a spontaneous decision that I’m really enjoying. I’m a Halloween-all-year kind of girl, so it fits my personality.

Christmas music is the one thing that’s been a constant through the ennui. With music on my mind, I wrote down a lot of these feelings about Christmas that people just don’t seem to talk about, especially when it comes to singletons and people who aren’t churchgoers. Sure, sometimes I feel like the Grinch (don’t most of us grow up into the Grinch?), but really, I’m more sad than angry. However, I think letting go of what Christmas used to be has helped me enjoy it in my new ways.

MISSING CHRISTMAS

As a child, I saw Santa through the open bedroom door
Sick with excitement at what morning had in store
I saw in him in the darkness, which fueled my belief
Of magical reindeer who come when you sleep

Half-eaten carrots and hoofprints on snow
Once you spot the lies they only start to grow
When magic becomes just another sleight of hand
One starts to wonder where Christmas should stand

The stories repeat so often, I know them by heart.
Growing up without children, I’ve no longer a part
Meaningless, meaning less every year
And now Christmas seems like every other part of the year, I fear…

The moment I stopped looking for Christmas
Was the same time the magic died
Its epitaph written in my attic-lost tree
I mourn for the death of a magical time

I love buying gifts for my family and friends
Receiving doesn’t matter much after it ends
The truth is I lost Christmas a long time ago.
I’ve struggled to find it again, but I know…

That feasts, friends, and families simply don’t
Make the time any more magical, the season just won’t
Reach as far inside of me as it did once before
When magic and miracles brought hope to my door

Half-eaten carrots and hoofprints on snow
Once you spot the lies they only start to grow
When magic becomes just another sleight of hand
One starts to wonder where Christmas should stand.