Rebellious Decorations!

Holiday decorations are cool!
No, I'm not slow that way. Just now in my almost 30th year realizing "HEY, every one is really on to something." I've actually been hip to this idea for years now....but I'm now just verbalizing my enjoyment of it all.
This whole decking the halls thing is a blast, it's like Christmas doesn't just come once a year, it explodes into our living rooms with the force of a small (albeit pretty) nuclear explosion.
Every last little bit of space, and even some spaces that are physics-ly impossible and shouldn't exist are trimmed out with garland and lights and bits of cinnamony smelling things that torture you with their home baked goody good scents. Not to mention mock you cruelly with their non-edible, glue based dough ways.
I just love it, I love the whole dang month. The fervor with which people will throw themselves in altering their daily homes and lives for the month of December. I love the millions of strands of pretty lights that go up. I squelch my other wise eco-friendly soul with a piece of chocolate anything and ooh and awww over all the neighbor's efforts. I look past the energy gobbling strands of lights, feeling only slightly superior with my own energy efficient LED ones and bask in the neighbor's good will.
I could give a hoot about them all the rest of year. Don't wanna see em, smell em, hear em or really even be aware of their existence but come Christmas time...tinsel and mistletoe infect my soul and I gaze upon their sloppily decked out decks with twinkling, sporadically flashing lights and feel a glow in my heart that is all about neighborly love and not a bit about the eggnog.
We some how squeeze all of our most handsome Christmas decorations, that are banished to storage for most of the year like a relative we're ashamed of and only drag out for *special* occasions, into our already overcrowded homes...and we LIKE it.
Everything looks better with a little ceramic Santa standing next to it doncha think? Doesn't matter if Santa has to suck his stomach in to fit next to the votive holder, the bowl of pretty stones, the vase of fake flowers, the clock and the cool wooden dragon. (all essentials to our daily life and couldn't possibly ever part with bits of pretty, that hold down the surface of the table all year.)
You might realize (in the back of your holiday humming mind) that a little side table is so full to the brim already that the ominous groaning is actually the foreshadowing of it's legs giving way and not in fact a ghost that you have to catch a recording of on your mp3 player......but it doesn't matter.
You slide in a an itsy bitsy, absolutely adorable wooden reindeer and suddenly it looks like a million bucks, like you channeled a designer for those 3 crucial reindeer sliding seconds and now that table is no longer cluttered and dusty but FESTIVE and FUN!
I love it!
Too much....hey don't blame me Alan does it too.
It was he who started it all....all innocently, giant baby blue eyes batting away one fine Christmas season past (as in the January AFTER a holiday) "That holly garland looks good there, we should leave it up."
Well he's right, it did look good, I mean it wasn't shouting "LOOK at ME I'm Christmas in July!" so we left it. And soon it was absorbed into the fabric of our every day lives as a normal and pleasant bit of eye candy around the window. Maybe a stranger or relative would see it as what it really is, a Christmas decoration that should have been taken down 5 years ago? I don't know, we don't let people into our home, that would spoil the effect we're going for.
And so with every holiday that passes the amount of decorations I have to pack up seems a little less, not insanely, qualify for an intervention less, but in all truth there's always a bit of Christmas that refuses to leave.
Who rebels against being smothered in bubble wrap, being silenced with it's tomb of cardboard and hidden away like a dark and dirty secret in the spidery depths of the garage.
It yearns to be free and live life with the elite of our decor, to experience a March, a July or dare I say it......even October.
So we have happy holly garland over the window, and a tiny little high spirited Santa ornament hangs near my computer and gazes lustily about in satisfaction at defeating the packing process. He's so tiny and stealth like he just slips into the background noise of our life.
The occasional strand of LED lights curls itself ever the more tighter around our ficus tree, it shows me the full glory of it's warm colours and begs with an articulateness that is astounding for a glorified electrical cord to be left free. To bring a little warmth to the room in an April. So I agree, but the lights on the bedroom window have a fit, in in a weirdly prissy accent demand to be left out as well, if the ficus lights stay in the living room then it shall have the bedroom and would I please call it Mr.Finkle as I offend it's sensibilities with my LED label....ummmm o.k.......it can stay.
Our pretty (year round) twig tree that makes me feel like nature has burst forth in our living room, reclaiming a bit of space that should have rightfully been it's own anyways looks glorious. Dripping in pretty icicles, that thanks to modern technology can be hung and look perfectly frozen for...well...ever. They sparkle and shine and I turn a blind eye to their shimmeryness as I pack the not so fortunate Christmas decorations away.
Who wouldn't want a bit of holiday sparkle on a chilled evening in February?
I feel reckless and daring, like I am breaking a forbidden rule. The largely unspoken, agreed upon by many...
Though shalt not leave your holiday decorations up as regular decorations!
But ya know what? It feels good.
There's a certain joy we get from living life our own way and not necessarily by a calendar.
And more importantly...
the Christmas Police have yet to knock down my door for reckless and dangerous use of a holiday ornament.