Sunday, December 27, 2020
Happy Holidays!
Boy, if only something had happened in 2020 that I could write about here! Some years have a defining event, like Watergate or the release of the classic Lindsay Lohan feature Just My Luck, but this year? I’m coming up short. So I guess I’ll just creep back to my COVID bunker and take a nice hand sanitizer bath while I work up the courage to venture out into the toilet paper riots.
Seriously, though, it’s been a strange year. We went from googling slow cooker recipes and wondering who the hell greenlit The Goop Lab back in February to checking on our local ICU capacities and trading sexual favors for Clorox wipesin March. Quarantine seemed kind of dope at first, what with not having to take public transit or put on real pants and all, but soon the charm of pretending one might actually finish an entire knitting project and changing one’s Zoom background to a photo of the Hindenburg disaster started to fade. June rolled around and the reality struck that ‘80s-themed booze cruises and topless street festivals were probably not going to be on the menu for this year. We started forming secret quarantine clusters of the few people we liked and trusted enough to risk them coughing near us while binge watching Below Deck: Mediterranean, and developed creative new ways of socially distancing things like Instagram influencing and sex. As summer pressed on, we took masks and made them fashion, though oxygen tanks and iron lungs remained depressingly utilitarian. The point is, we managed to adapt and make the best of things, even if maybe Florence Pugh’s Breakout Year got pushed back a bit and gender reveal parties weren’t ideally suited for the digital environment. And then in September, Taco Bell announced it was getting rid of the Mexican Pizza. Good lord, haven’t we all suffered enough?
And now we face the specter of socially distanced holidays: A Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade where Billie Eilishis forced to lip sync on the StarKist Tuna float without the benefit of a live audience. Office holiday parties minus the customary adultery and sexual harassment. Christmas and Hanukkah dinners where grandparents are unable to properly harangue their single grandchildren for refusing to be set up with their podiatrist’s mailman because the Facetime connection keeps cutting out. Allegedly. And Hallmark holiday movies that are exactly the same as always because they were all filmed in Vancouver sixteen months ago using an audio-animatronic Candace Cameron-Bure (same as the original, but more likely to develop human emotions).
It will definitely be different. But wasn’t the whole point of The Grinch that the holidays should be about connecting with loved ones and not all of the Flimflambles and Zodiderads? I’m actually asking, because ever since I saw Jim Carrey in that lime green Perez Hilton costume, I’ve been repressing all related content. My own personal view, however, is that making our celebrations smaller, simpler, and more personal can be a very good thing. For example, not spending days preparing enough complex carbohydrates to give two dozen guests low-grade diabetes may give us more time to actually talk with our parents, and not just about the lawn-maintenance and Kohl’s-coupon-related topics that tend to rise to the top of their agendas. Not running from store to store trying to find that Succession-themed Lego set little Timmy’s been dreaming of might actually encourage us to buy him a damn book for once, so we stop getting notes from school that he called Beverly Cleary “basic.” And not going to midnight mass with hundreds of strangers just might save us from having to listen to a children’s choir. I’ll just say it: fewer little drummer boys, more Cardi Bs.
So yeah, hang in there. 2020 has been rough, but it turns out there’s a new year coming. Here’s hoping it’s safe, sanitary, and blessed with a vaccine powerful enough to kill every last virus in Johnny Depp’s body.
