Me, grandma and Hedda, my sister.
Merry Christmas y'all! Joyeux Nöel! Feliz Navidad! God Jul! And such..
There are so many ways to greet Christmas. And there are so many ways to deal with this Christly Holiday.
How we, them Oftedahls, do it is just the same procedure as every year (to frase "Grevinnen og Hovemesteren", which is a famous video clip everyone loves to watch the 23rd..............................). Which I find a bit sad and funny at the same time cause I can't separate not even one Christmas from the other besides the ones when I was younger and we celebrated at a nice winter hotel the whole week with my fathers family. And I also remember the times when we celebrated at grandmas place in Florø but thats like 16 years ago I think.. Anyhow, its a nice way of doing it.. Although I really dislike that all my Christmas memories end up in one small basket of porridge in my mind.
I'm super grateful that I got my whole family in good shape and health and that we all can celebrate together.
(It's also forever gonna be a puzzle to me why we Norwegians still celebrate christian traditions, when none of us Norwegians really are truly religious. Just to add in a random thoughts)
Anyhow, we celebrate being together and eating LOADS of food just like majority of people in Norway. This year we were opening presents for 3 long hours. Which is sad an not ok after my opinion. Frustrating to look at. Instead of long and deep and meaningful conversations I'm left drained with energy only 1 hour in.
Why can't we just celebrate each other, the love we all carry for one another? Instead of wasting time on things that doesn't matter in the moment? We leave the party and still do not know one bit more about the other people than we already knew.
Well at least, all of the family is together under one roof and we all are perfectly healthy. Really, I've got not reason to complain. I just wish we could be a bit more.. Humble, sustainable and loving towards the whole wide world instead.
My dream Christmas would either be to travel with the whole family, donate all the money usually spent on gifts to research in stead, on longevity research, or to gather at a large venue and invite immigrants and poor people and other people and have this huge celebration of love. Where EVERYONE is welcome. One day. This is something I'd like to start doing. Cause all the gifting and stress and expectations all people have makes me SICK. Its LOVE that we are supposed to celebrate. I cant wait until this is what is the norm in our society.
One gift each would be more than enough. And what would be better was if that we traded stuff that we already had, stuff that I got tired of might please my sister.
There are so many ways to celebrate Christmas that would make me way less embarrassed.
I guess its soon time for me to arrange christmas where I set the rules.
Where the zone is completely stressfree, one gift for all, and deep meaningful conversations will rule the whole evening. Not some random bullshit like we always do, and end up leaving the party and holiday without even know ONE more tiny bit of each other. I've left Stavanger now, and I still have NO clue on how my mother, father, siblings, grandparents and my aunt and her familys year went, what was meaningful to them, what did they enjoy the most, what did they learn, did they regret anything, what was the most wonderful they experienced, and the worst... etc... and I'd lso like to hear what they wish for and plan for in 2018.
What does a merry Christmas mean to you ? Do you have lots of expectations? What is a dream Christmas for you? And does reality ever live up to your expectations?
Merry Merry Merry Christmas. Enjoy spending time with the people you love and try embrace every minute with gratitude.