I’ve noticed a lot of Christmas creep lately, and I’m not sure how I feel about it.
A couple of neighbors already have their Christmas lights up and blazing. This is wrong.
I thought there was some sort of Supreme Court ruling that you must put your Christmas lights up on Thanksgiving weekend or later. Am I wrong about that? Even if for some reason —like thermonuclear war — that you had to hang your lights up early, you shouldn’t technically plug them in until then.
I hate to judge other people (OK, I’m lying, I love to judge other people) but I’m concerned that this Christmas creep could lead to a slippery slope, in which case I might have to mix my metaphors even more.
What if everyone turned on their lights early? Would we have to build a new power plant? Electric companies are still sparring with consumers over how much we should all pay for closing the poorly built San Onofre nuclear power plant, because heaven forbid the companies’ shareholders should pay for the whole thing. We don’t need another one of those scenarios.
I started noticing Christmas decor going up in stores around August, when it was still so hot we were wiping our brows as if we all lived in Mississippi. Who buys gigantic plastic snowmen in August? Did you? Please tell me why. Someone must be buying this stuff, or they wouldn’t put it out.
Sometimes, I see a confusing mix of Halloween and Christmas items all jumbled up together. This could lead to holiday confusion, especially with people like me who are starting to lose it a bit. And don’t get me started on those inflatable lawn decorations everyone’s buying these days, with their blowers going all night long and looking all day long like a melted puddle of the bad witch from “The Wizard of Oz.”
As a veteran newspaper reporter, I’ve been in approximately 10 zillion strangers’ houses, including ones where a dusty Christmas tree is still up and lighted in July. If that is you, I don’t judge you. Honestly, I’d probably have the same if people in my house didn’t take ours down for me.
If you want a Christmas tree in your house 365 days a year to cheer yourself up, more power to you. However, I still don’t want to see lights blazing in front of your house until the day after Thanksgiving.
Now, I don’t want to sound like the crabbiest board member of a homeowners association. You know, those people who make rules about how you can decorate your house for the holidays. I don’t live in a community like that, because I’d just become an outlaw and get thrown out, or fined until I was destitute. My boss will tell you that I hate rules on principle and, yes, it sometimes gets me in trouble.
There have been many lawsuits over the issue of Christmas decorations on front lawns because (a) there are too many lawyers and (b) people have nothing better to do.
Sometimes, people sue for religious discrimination, saying their Christian decorations or parties are protected free speech. And some homeowners’ associations complain that overtly Christian decorations, as in for example a Nativity scene, could violate the rights of the non-Christians in the community.
This all gives me a headache. I don’t want to see a crucifix hanging in my kid’s third grade class, but putting a Nativity scene on your lawn should not be a capital offense, any more than putting a Star of David or Menorah should be.
But I don’t want to see any of them before Thanksgiving. Even the Festival of Lights at the Mission Inn in Riverside is starting earlier now. They used to switch on the big light show on the day after Thanksgiving. Now, they do it on the Saturday before Thanksgiving. I can’t really complain about this, since it’s such a beautiful and free spectacle, I appreciate it and I’m not paying for the electricity, but that won’t stop me from using it to make my point.
All right, after being one of those “get off my lawn” people in most of this column, let me say that I also have a deep yearning for Christmas this year. I’ve been buying and stashing presents for months now, to the point that my young adult son, Cheetah Boy, has found some of them and helped himself, because why would he wash his boxer shorts when there’s a package of brand-new ones hidden in the closet?
I even bought a set of those plush “elf feet” that stick out of the back of your car, like you’ve imprisoned Will Ferrell there. Now I just need a set of Rudolph antlers to stick on the side of the windshield. And I’ll wait until Thanksgiving to stick them on