Happiness is a warm fort
It’s been brought to my attention that a popular thing to do among writers of columns is to make lists. Top 10 lists, Things I Like lists, etc. And because what I strive for, more than anything else in life, is to be popular and do popular things, I’ve made a list.
It’s a list of things that I will be doing over the next few weeks, my month off from life I like to call it, and suggest that you do too. It isn’t necessarily a “Best Things to Do Over Xmas Break” list, because that would be presumptuous and presumptuous isn’t my style.
But I’ll have you know that this month was granted to us college students by our creator (thank you President Turner) for the sole divine purpose of wasting inordinate amounts of time, and I, my friends, am the world’s most ingenious time waster. It may therefore behoove you to follow my example, if wasting time is an item on your personal life agenda. There are a few worthwhile, non-wasteful things thrown in for good measure. See if you can tell which is which.
Sleep until 30 minutes before sunset at least once.
This will demand a bit of planning, because it will most likely require participation in licentious, Bacchanalian irresponsibilities culminating about 30 minutes before the preceding sunrise. There’s also the risk that it may set off a vicious nocturnal cycle of erratic sleep patterns that will have to be remedied in order for the rest of the items on the list to take place. I will rise to the challenges.
Watch A Christmas Story at least four times consecutively.
Some basic cable channel runs a 97-hour marathon of it every year, and every year it gets funnier, and funnier. It never gets old!
And unless Hollywood or some other pandering movie-making engine one day outdoes it with a shiny new holiday classic (painfully unlikely this season), it will always make us roll with Christmas laughter.
Sublime humor matched with crack-shot writing have immortalized Ralphie and Randy in a narrated world of glowing electric sex, BB gun conspiracy, and Chinese Christmas dinner. Well worth at least an 8-hour investment of time on a couch with a hot cup or ten of cocoa.
Visit the Dallas Arboretum.
This is one of those activities I’ll save for that random, blindingly sunny 80-degree December day.
Or at least a day when the gonad-chilling cold isn’t quite so damp. Here I will get lost in a decidedly un-Texan bamboo forest, catch the view from what’s probably the only hill within a 50-mile radius of the metroplex, and witness the inspiring persistence of nature in the face of urban encroachment. I will do so with someone I don’t mind keeping warm.
Building elaborate fortress out of household linens.
Because underneath my pensive, austere, and unfailingly mature exterior I’m actually 9 years old on a good day, no school means pillow castle. Preferably assembled around a TV, and absolutely requiring a password (perhaps augmented by secret handshake) for admittance, this cozy, Downy-scented hideaway will stay up as long as I see fit to occupy it, regardless of any inconvenience caused to cohabitors. Inside, naps, cookies, soul-numbing holiday cartoons, and a rousing game of phonetic Scrabble will likely take place.
Listen to lots of old jazz.
Billie Holiday is my personal favorite this time of year. Velvety horns, haunting voices and rich, wintery melodies make the cold less excruciating and the gray world appear more vibrant. Life-affirming in every way.
Remember that Jesus is not necessarily the reason for the season.
As much as we all might like this to be the case, Toys R Us, JC Penney, and the other 53 retail apostles have taken up the cross and turned the merriment into a consumer’s dream. But don’t despair!
Just because we’ve replaced Christian values with overconsumption of all varieties doesn’t mean Christmas is dead. Relax and revel in the gaudily-lit miracle of first world celebratory capabilities. And most importantly, as some great person once said, Jesus died for your sins, so don’t render his martyrdom meaningless by not committing them.
An obnoxious “Thank you, Jesus!” bellowed through an eggnog-induced stupor is all the Christianity you need display this time of year to enjoy the fruits of our most American holiday.
Give, give, give.
I plan on spending more than I can afford, in all capacities, on the people I love (who are many) this month. Financially this doesn’t mean a great deal, because I can’t afford much to begin with. Nevertheless, people in my good graces can expect ostentatiously large gifts, too many hugs, and irrepressible holiday cheer from me.
I will be giving toys to poor kids, food to hungry families, and my time to otherwise disadvantaged individuals for whom December is merely another month of spartan desperation in a cold, cruel world.
This I do while reminding myself that I am damn lucky to have the leisure time to sit here and make a list, much less carry out the admittedly mundane and silly activities on it.
Whatever you choose to celebrate this season, whether it’s the birth of the founder of the modern western calendar, nine days of dreidels and latkes, Kwanzaa, cold weather or simply being in between semesters, bear in mind that you do indeed have much to celebrate. Enjoy your well-deserved down time.
