Christmas time. Its a time for family and for showing the ones you care about that you care about them by giving them things. I'm very confused. Nobody in my family goes to church, no one is particularly religious, except for my aunt and my mom, who are what can best be generalized as Buddhist. So why do we exchange gifts every year amongst the family members? When I was a kid I can't recall think about this because I only cared about getting gifts and playing with my cousins. But now that I'm grown and the adults no longer shower the "children," who are mostly college graduates now, with gifts. This year all the parents, mine and my aunts/uncles all decided the "kids" don't need gifts or money from them any more and we bought each other gifts instead. This made me realize the holiday, for my extended family, is an odd thing. Its like we celebrate it because we live in America and the holiday here is such a part of the culture. My cousins and myself are all the first generation of kids born here in the United States and perhaps celebrating this holiday was a way for the family to help us meld into our dual lives that we live.

I can remember my mom used to buy tickets for the family to goto this church performance of the story of Christmas at Crystal Cathedral. It was a really nice one with flying angels and everything, and perhaps she just enjoyed the production values, but mixing that with the non-denominational nature of my family seems odd. But I've even been to a Christian summer camp as well as Buddhist ones (the Christian ones were more fun, archery is infinitely more exciting than chanting). I suppose this lends to explain why I do have exposure to many different cultures and people and why I feel I'm generally accepting of everyone but I also think that it has played a part in my lack of a social identity. America is indeed a melting pot, but I don't know how well I've mixed in. Like in the recipe of America's melting pot, I'm one of those ingredients that fits in and enhances the soup but really doesn't belong? No, that was a horrible analogy. I got a better one, I'm like the crust that forms on the top of the soup, I fit in but I'm still sort of on the outside of the soup. Enjoyable, but not a necessity. Wow, that was an amazing analogy, I win!

I think Christmas, although it is the celebration of the life and birth of Christ, it has definitely evolved into something else in this day and age. Obviously the commercialism of the gift giving is a something entire books have been written for, the fact that it represents a happy time for children and time for family to get together still means something nice. Even if they just called it winter break, like they do at elementary schools for politically correct purposes, I still think it means the same thing. You can hate commercialism, but you can't hate that it allows time for family to be together and gives children time off school and adults time off work for a good reason, to be with family. Even if the Christmas name is misleading and the gift giving often leads to lighter wallets.

Happy Non-Denominational Christmas! Yay for rambling posts!

Bloc Party - Flux