Every year around this time, I start rethinking my choice of religion.

It actually begins around Halloween when sadistic retailers begin putting out Christmas decorations in an attempt to entice shoppers into boosting lagging October sales. Seeing Christmas trees in October sends me into a panic attack. As a type-A person, I am always sure that I’ve forgotten something, that I’m missing something, that I’m behind. When all those yuletide trimmings start popping up, I am in an instant tizzy: Has everyone else started their shopping already?!

It just gets worse from there. My children see the trees and pictures of Santa and television commercials advertising holiday sales, and they start their Christmas begging. My parents and in-laws begin sending me e-mails and calling me to find out what is on everyone’s wish lists. Every friend and acquaintance I have suddenly needs to put an event on my calendar. There are decorations to be hung, cards to be sent, parties to attend, cookies to bake, and dinners to prepare.

And there’s all the silly little things that shouldn’t matter, but they do because Christmas comes only once a year. See, we have all this stuff, and it’s stuff that we have to use in the month of December because using it in May or June would be weird and/or depressing. First, there’s clothes and jewelry - Santa sweatshirts, snowflake sweaters, red and green plaid skirts and blazers, jingle bell earrings. I have to go through my closet and pull out all these items to make sure I wear them or they’ll just sit for another year, collecting dust. Then there are books to read, especially Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol,” my all-time favorite book that I have read every year since I was about 10. 

Finally, there are CD’s, MP3’s, videos and DVD’s. I have to hunt down all my music and movies that we must listen to or watch now or wait another year. And the collection is getting ridiculous, especially the movies: “It’s a Wonderful Life,” “White Christmas,” “A Christmas Story,” “Elf,” “Mickey’s Christmas Carol,” “Rudolph,” “Frosty,” and “How the Grinch Stole Christmas.”

There’s just one other thing that makes my Christmas less than merry. The imbalance between what my female friends and I are doing and what my husband, my father and their guy friends are doing to prepare for the holidays. Don’t get me wrong: my husband and my dad are both wonderful men, and I adore them. But when they say, “Why are you so stressed? Everything will be fine even if you don’t get all that stuff done,” I want to scream! They do little, if any, shopping, wrapping and cooking. If it were up to them, no cards would be sent, no decorations would be hung (except maybe the outside lights which is their responsibility, but they have to be hounded into putting them up). Christmas would be like any other day. So how can they wonder why I’m stressed? Do they really think everything would be just fine even if all their women did nothing to prepare? Argh.

So now it’s two weeks before Christmas, and I’m only about a third done with shopping. I have two dinners I have to attend tonight, so I’ll be leaving one early to get to the other one late. My son is attending two parties and throwing another one at our house. We ordered our Christmas cards online two weeks ago, but they haven’t arrived yet, so I’ll be rushing to get those out the minute they come in. Yet another joyful, peaceful, relaxing holiday season.

If it weren’t for Jesus being such a great guy who deserves a really great birthday, I think I’d go Buddhist. At least for the month of December.