Thoughts

Today I am supposed to be taking down all the Christmas decorations. Well, actually, they should've come down on the 7th, after the Epiphany, but I said I would do it over the weekend. Yesterday, I said that I was taking the day off & would do it today. So far today, I thought about it, but haven't done anything. This is the exact route of procrastination I seem to follow each year after Christmas & New Year. Generally speaking, I have a 'peak' energy day sometime around the second or third, when my internal voice says, "let's take down all the decorations!" But, since as a child (many l-o-n-g years ago), we always left the tree and all decorations up until after Father Matthew Kebe had come by on the feast of the Epiphany to bless our home, it feels wrong to take everything down before the 6th of January. Forget the fact the saintly Fr Kebe has been gone from this world since I was in high school. Forget the fact that since Fr Kebe, no one has blessed our home(s). There is a deep, inexplicable tradition within me that will not be denied.

Why? And where does this come from?

Why does it seem somehow disloyal to my past, my upbringing, my Slovenian Grandparents and what my dad would expect, to take down the tree and all the trappings before January 6? It's not like my dysfunctional family, either immediate, or extended, is immersed in tradition. I can barely get them to drive the 15 minutes to my house for any holiday. Maybe it's part of my rebellious spirit; I'm clinging to what we always did, in resistance to what seems to be the norm these days - put the tree up right after Thanksgiving and take it down on New Years. Maybe.

I don't really have an answer to the "why" or the origin of the feeling. Right now, I'm simply thinking that maybe another cup of coffee will be the magic motivator. We'll see.