The Pain of Christmas

Irrelivant to this article but I had to show you my new dog! Will be writing about her soon :)

I hate Christmas.  For some reason whenever I share this with someone they gasp in horror and make the sign of the cross, but I do.  I hate it.  I do not hate my family.  Or eating.  But those pleasures can be partaken in without the colossal level of fuss that must be made in the lead up to December 25^th.  

I feel ambushed by the blaring advertising that begins around August and ramps up from there.  I could be happily watching the TV or reading the paper when my anxiety is suddenly and cruelly tweaked by the reminder that YOU NEED TO BUY YOUR LOVED ONE THIS JUICE MACHINE THAT YOU CAN’T AFFORD AND YOU’RE RUNNING OUT OF TIME DAMMIT.  The anxiety then mixes itself in with guilt and self-berating in a poisonous mental cocktail.  You don’t have the juice machine.  Can’t afford the juice machine.  Could afford it if you didn’t spend so much on yourself.  Are just making excuses because you don’t want to endure the depravity of Highpoint Shopping Town.         

Which brings me to Highpoint Shopping Town.  I live near there but I really really hate that place.  And places of that nature.  They stink of everything that is wrong with humanity.  And of sweaty boys because there are heaps of them hanging around in their uniforms trying to communicate with the pubescent girls.  I find it wholly depressing that our number one Holiday Destination is an emporium dedicated unapologetically to the art of consumerism.  It brings on a peculiar kind of sadness traipsing around the isles trying to get inspired to shop.  A feeling of emptiness and of being lost because that place is a fucking maze.  Then once you’ve finally bought the bloody juice machine you’ve got to walk like ten K’s back to your car in the searing heat and you always forget to put the silver car insulating thingy up.   

    

My relatives are all really nice but they like to have Christmas where they live, on the Mornington Peninsula.  To get to the Morning Peninsula you need a car, and to get back in that car you need to not be drunk.  And what is Christmas without getting drunk?  Last Christmas we were considering staying over at someone’s place, but the host’s house was full, as was my Auntie’s near by place, unless we had a tent.  Did we have a tent?  

If you like to be sane, you should really have a list of Christmas presents that require purchasing, and that list should be gradually accounted for throughout the preceding months.  I apparently do not like to be sane, because I inevitably find myself sprinting around in a crazed rage on December 24^th, screaming at Tom on the phone to ‘TAKE THAT ONE BACK! IT’S THE LEMON SCENTED CANDLE THAT YOU’RE GETTING YOU GOOD FOR NOTHING LOUT!’ while pushing some elderly person out of the way to get to the I-lost-my-leg-but-not-my-lust-for-life book for mum.  

I also am not a fan of the whole overly PC let’s-be-sensitive-to-non-Christians-thing.  The holiday is called Christmas.  I’m pretty sure Muslim people are aware of this and are suitably non-offended as to be able to survive the occasion.  You refraining from saying ‘Merry Christmas’ to them and instead saying, while you pat yourself on the back, ‘Happy Holidays’, is akin to them dreaming up some euphemistic greeting to mask the offensiveness of Eid Al-Fitr.  Redundant and kind of patronizing.      

I am not noble enough to provide a theoretical argument to justify my complaining.  You know, ‘Christmas isn’t about love and Christ anymore it’s just one big exercise in consumerism and greed’- that kind of thing.  I don’t really mind what it’s about.  I just mind that it stresses me the feck out and is a major anxiety trigger.  New Years, on the other hand, New Years I like.  All you have to do come December 31^st is take your brand new Mastiff puppy to Edinborough Gardens and drink shit loads of Champagne.  At least, that’s all I’m planning on doing.  Happy New Year everyone and thankyou so much for supporting me this year!  Katie xxx     

Maybe Baby!

Seriously, I'm a natural, right?

Every time I set eyes upon a squishy, beaming little infant, I am instantaneously possessed by a primal urge to procreate.  A deep, aching longing sets in such that it’s all I can do not to grab the thing and run.  Friends, upon witnessing what must resemble a junkie greedily eyeing off someone else’s smack, will take my hand and wordlessly steer me away, my head swivelling on its axis like Linda Blair from the exorcist as the bundle disappears from sight.  There’s clucky.  And then there’s me.    

 

For years I have been waiting impatiently to reach that magical point at which maturity, age and financial security combine sufficiently to justify producing my own squishy infant.  That time is not yet upon me.  So I placate myself with the secret hope that maybe, just maybe, it will happen by accident.  Who am I to question the gods of conception if they decide that the time has come to bestow upon me a foetus, despite being utterly, desperately unprepared? 

   

It was with this secret hope in mind that I stared at the inside of my undies the other day.  There was nothing, not a speck.  I had missed my period.  You’ve been stressed, I told myself.  There’s a perfectly good explanation for it.  But nothing could stop my pounding heart.  Maybe it was time! 

As one day passed, then another, I couldn’t help but analyse every twinge.  Was that a slight burning in my right ovary?  Must be an early pregnancy symptom!  What about that dull ache in my lower back?  I rushed to consult doctor Google.  Yes!  Pregnancy symptom!  No matter that a back ache is also symptomatic of precisely five thousand other afflictions.  When combined with the ovary burning and the sweaty left foot, there was simply no other explanation!

Quietly, I became a pregnancy forum addict.  At every opportunity I would pull out my phone, an exhilarating sense of curiosity and stealth spurring me on.  I would devour the stories of my cyber peers like delicious morsels of hope.  Mary from Toronto had also experienced slight cramping in her left side before getting her BFP (Big fat Positive); Stella from Liverpool described being too tired to get out of bed.  It all sounded just like me!  Convinced of my state as mother-to-be, I looked up baby names, pregnancy diets, the relative merits of the controversial but effective bedtime technique controlled crying. 

I dared not tell Tom about my secret pleasure, for the exact same reason that I dared not piss on a stick.  I was having so much fun conspiring to be a mother, I was wary of anything that might burst my bubble.  I did, after a few days, give in to the urge to interrogate my mother. 

‘When did you first know you were pregnant?’  I asked in the most casual tone I could muster as Mum watered her vegetables.

‘Well, the first thing I noticed was my boobs were sort of tingly.  And I would have waves of nausea but I didn’t actually vomit.  The biggest thing was feeling like I had the flu, all hot and bothered, especially in the morning.’  Mum paused.  ‘Katie?  What’s wrong?’     

I had stopped short and was staring at my mother, immobile, a weed that I had plucked from a pot plant dangling limp from my clenched fist.  I WAS PREGNANT!  I rushed inside the house and grabbed the pregnancy test I had been carrying around in my bag.  Wrestling it frantically from its plastic casing, my mind was a cyclone of fears.  Where would we live?  How would I afford not to work?  Did Tom really want to call it John?  That name was so dated!  Anxiety threatened to consume me as I waited breathlessly for the three minutes it takes the test to work.

I turned it over.  One line.  Relief poured over me.  A tiny, tingly bit of disappointment lurked amongst the feels, but mainly, I was relieved.

I want a baby.  And some day soon I’ll be ready for one.  Until then, I’m happy to get by on my fantasising and forum-trolling.   

Tales from a Ten Year Reunion

If you have been reading this blog, you would be aware that I spend an unhealthy chunk of my life fretting about the comparative failings of my life, as compared to, say, someone with the word ‘regional’ in their job title.  My thoughts are divided in relatively even quantities between; dreaming up characters and plots for my writing; berating myself incessantly that I’ve elected to spend my life dreaming up characters and plots for my writing.  Hence it was with great fear and trepidation that I scrolled through the Facebook invite to my ten year high school reunion.  Ex-classmates.  With careers.  Careers that pay in currency other than Facebook likes.  No matter, I said to myself with sudden and intense glee, I would lie.  Lie my little fucking ass off.  I wouldn’t even tell a far fetched lie.  It would entirely plausible.  I would simply add, like, 10 extra published books to me portfolio.

I sailed through several days placated by the by the brilliance of my ruse, until of course it hit me that I write a blog.  A blog which serves as a soapbox from which to spew my life’s failings onto the internet.  FUCK!  I screamed loudly into my cereal.  Because I had already decided what to wear and was kind of looking forward to it and now I would have to face the taunting mass of alumni sans vocational alibi.  I WOULD JUST HAVE TO BE MY SOMETIMES SHIT SELF!

I had a panic attack in the taxi.  Not a full blown I-think-I’m-dying attack but enough to fuck up my breathing so I was audibly sucking air in and out, in and out.  The taxi driver asked me if I was ok.  I ignored him and continued to plan my entrance.  If I could just get to Helinka, I could hide behind her and only pop out intermittently to speak to people I wasn’t intimidated by.  No!  I thought suddenly as the taxi pulled up to the pub.  That is a really fucking dumb and fundamentally flawed idea!  And with that I was there, walking in, with no career and no plan. 

Since I was late I had no choice but to stumble right into the action.  This is what I thought, in a twisted muddle, as I wormed my way through the crowd feigning an irrational fascination with the floor:  Everyone looks exactly the same!  Do I look exactly the same?  Probably not!  I’m probably the only one who doesn’t look exactly the same!  Oh shit there’s the popular girls.  Katie you idiot you’re 28 years old they are not the fucking ‘popular girls’ anymore!  Still think I’ll avoid them for a while.  I spotted Helinka and was inserted by default into a conversation with Dave, an ex-drama enthusiast who had been known for his eccentricities and sometimes bullish nature.  ‘I’ve read your blog!’  He boomed.  I winced.  ‘It’s really good!  It’s great that you’re so honest!’ 

Not for one second had it occurred to me that my pathological penchant for over-sharing might count as a plus.  I peered up at Dave, confused.

‘I especially like the one where you have an enormous anxiety attack and end up crying into the floor!’ 

A wave of vomit threatened to make itself present and I swallowed, hard.  I had been half hoping the more embarrassing details of my blog might have escaped my peers’ attention.  But as Dave began chatting animatedly about his love of craft beer, another feeling began to materialise.  Relief.  If everyone was savvy to my lunacy, there really wasn’t any point putting on airs.  I had been relieved of the burden of trying to seem accomplished!  So, having been spared the colossal task of bullshitting everyone, I excused myself, went to the bar, and began drinking wine with gay abandon.                    

As it turned out, I had once again managed to make a colossal drama out of the sparsest of materials.  No one gave a fuck that I was just a writer.  No one accused me of being a deadbeat.  And as I caught up with friends of yesteryear, I honestly felt a bit stupid for having believed people would have been invested enough in my life to care.

 

There were a couple of hours of polite chit chat, and early leavers could have been fooled into thinking we had all grown up.  But come 11 o Clock, we had fallen under some sort of high school spell, and regressed back to teenage-party-mode.  One ex classmate who I was yet to talk to pulled me suddenly and violently in for a hug.  That’s nice, I thought, until I realized he was simply using me as a means of remaining upright.  ‘How are you?’  I said into his hair.  He looked up at me and tried to speak, but instead just spat a bit and smiled wide.

I talked to all the ex popular girls, two of them were married which somehow rendered them not scary anymore, and they listened politely as I explained in great detail the feeding habits of my pigs.  

       

In true teenage party style we ended up back at Terry’s house.  I somehow forgot my plans to make a dignified early exit, and instead sought out my old crush, as I had every time I’d seen him since high school, and spent a lengthy amount of time lamenting to him the difficulties of having been so in love with him.  I would be embarrassed by this memory but I’ve done it that many times I’ve become kind of desensitized.  He listened politely for a while before going to the ‘toilet’ and never returning.

My last memory of the evening is of waking up on the couch in a puddle of my own drool whilst singing the lyrics to ‘We Can’t Stop’ by Miley Cyrus.  I had obviously passed out and, to the delight of the other stragglers surrounding me, been miraculously roused by the pop anthem.  ‘Do you like that song?’  Taunted one.  And, considering I’d been literally singing it in my sleep, I had to admit that yes, I did.  But it didn’t matter.  Any hope of appearing cool had long since been squandered.