What can I say, my middle name is Joy.

Well, it's Christmas time. Usually this is the season for people to feel all joyful and merry and be all motivated to be extra nice to everyone.
However, for me, this is the season that makes me realize what a horrible scrooge I am. I mean, first of all, those ultra-sugary people have always gotten on my nerves, simply because it is obvious that they just aren't human. But as soon as we get near Christmas, it's like every single person morphs into one of those people, only amped up on cheerful-steroids, too. But then it just wears off as soon as "the season" does. And don't get me wrong, I am all for the whole Operation Christmas Child stuff... but think about it, if we send those poor African children a box of goodies one day a year, what kind of message is that sending? It's sending one that says, "I'll be giving to the less-fortunate for one day, but the other 364 days of the year, this stuff is MINE."
Okay, so the poor Africans probably aren't reading into it like that at all and are just super duper grateful (everyone should do an Operation Christmas Child box), but I'm just saying... what's the point of picking a couple days out of the year to pretend we're all super kind and giving, if we're just going to go back to being...not that...the rest of the year? I mean, is a little consistency too much to ask for? I may be a grinch, but at least you can count on that!
And how 'bout this phrase: "He is the reason for the season." Yes...this is true...but He is also the reason for LIFE. Not just the season. Christ wasn't even born in December. The only reason we started celebrating it in December was because we had no other holidays to stick there.
This is probably making me sound like some heathen who refuses to celebrate the birth of Christ due to pessimism-overload. That's not it at all. I love celebrating Jesus, obviously, I just think we should celebrate Him as much every day as we do on Christmas. Not that I do that very well either, I'm not giving myself a free pass in this, I'm just talking in general here.

Now, moving on to other Christmas-related matters.
How 'bout this Santa Claus guy?
It was because of him that I first came to realize how confusing my brain is. See, even as a four-year-old, I thought the entire concept of a fat guy sneaking down my chimney and leaving me presents was completely absurd. Logically, it made no sense whatsoever.
Yet, at the same time, I spent most of my days living in an imaginary reality where I was a fearless Bello Knight of Dormynzandra, fighting off the shadow demons with my powers to control the earthly elements. Or I was Tarzan in a family of gorillas that I swear I could hear talking to me. Or I was washed onto the beaches of Dinotopia, living amongst the scientifically-advanced dinosaurs, flying around with my best friend, Goochie the velociraptor. Or I was a Jaguarundi cub (a South American jungle-cat, cousin of the Ocelot), venturing my way across the mysterious land of Meldeson.
You see, all of these things were completely real to me. But Santa Claus - no way. That was just ridiculous. Made up worlds, talking animals, mystical powers: of course. A north-pole dwelling grandpa creeping down the chimney: absolutely not.
I remember making my piano teacher's son cry one time because I told him that "only stupid kids believe in Santa Claus." I was five. And I was also thoroughly convinced that if I could only conjure up some of this blasted "pixie dust," I would legitimately learn to fly. But Santa...only fools believed in him.
Do you see why my mind can be a conflicting place to reside?
Of course, now that I think about it, maybe the issue has nothing to do with the size of my imagination or the ongoing battle between the right and left sides of my brain. I mean, I obviously dream big enough for everybody and their brother. But maybe I just find too much pleasure in crushing other people's dreams.
Yeah, that makes sense...goes right along with that whole thing about being such a scrooge.
If the dream is mine, it's real, and it's going to happen. But if the dream is someone else's, it's simply preposterous.
Wow, I suck.
You ever have one of these moments? Where you realize something about yourself that makes it so obvious that you are pretty much an awful person? These are not rare moments for me.

Last night I got a glimpse of where I might have inherited this gene of awfulness, though.

Alyssa: Mom, where are my barbie ornaments?

Mom: Hopefully not molding out in storage in the kennel.

Alyssa: Um, that would be horrible.

Mom: Yeah, there are a looot of horrible things in life.

*Bri laughs hysterically*



To make Christmas even better, we have this stupid tree that no one watered and is getting pine needles everywhere. Not the nice kind of needles either, the spikey kind that feel like barbed wire. I'm serious, it's like a massively overgrown porcupine just chilling in the middle of my house. A booby-trap in my own living room. I basically have to venture through a freaking mine field of sharp, pokey death just to get to the kitchen.
And my sister made me help her decorate this death-trap last night, so that was just a bundle of joy.
Especially when we got to the end and realized we had nothing to stick on top.
Good thing my creative geniusness arrived for the rescue.
All it takes is a piece of paper, a high-lighter, a pen, and some tape to get that star on the top of the tree.

It may be slightly pathetic, and/or sad, and fragile, but it gets the job done.
..story of this year's Christmas.


OH by the way, I found out that the ignorant blog-genie thinks I live in Alaska or something, because it seems that the time it always says it is when I post a blog is three hours early. It's 3:07am right now, but it's going to say it's 12:07. (I fixed this today! -Future Bri, the one from 1/10/11 that is more technologically advanced and realized the blog had been set to pacific time.)



And this concludes our happy segment of Bri's Collection of Cheerful Middle-Of-The-Night Christmas Contemplations.