Tag: christmas

So This is Christmas…

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“Bah humbug”

–A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

Usually when it’s beginning to look like Christmas, this fact brings joy. Instead, once you’re an adult– and you’re no longer waiting up at night to try and get a peek at Santa– Christmas becomes more about your dwindling bank account and the family members you still haven’t bought any gifts for. 

Cats break beloved Christmas tree ornaments. Every song on the radio is either a Christmas carol from the fifties that you’ve heard a thousand times before with dated lyrics like “take a look in the five and ten” and “children will listen” or a modern pop monstrosity that is basically Silent Night with a beat behind it. 

The instinct to just get through the season takes over. 

The moment that it’s time to buy something for my family members, they suddenly become humble beggars who couldn’t possibly ask for anything, giving me no clue as to what I should buy them for Christmas. 

In the days leading up to Christmas, I want to be cocooned in a warm house, tripping over presents in my living room and drinking out of a highball. 

Instead I find myself rushing to finish work before the year ends, putting together last minute holiday cards, sniffling through a head cold, ugly crying at It’s A Wonderful Life and The Family Stone, and then wondering how I’ll ever pay down my credit card once the holidays end. I’m like a woman in a Hallmark film who needs to be taught “the reason for the season” by a guy in a flannel shirt in my hometown. 

Then Christmas day comes and the whole thing is like a pregnancy: you forget about all of the agony that came with bringing it to fruition and the whole thing suddenly is a beautiful, life-affirming experience you would do all over again. 

For me, it’s not Christmas until Linus explains the true meaning of Christmas to me. There’s nothing like a kids Christmas special that tackles seasonal depression and commercialism, like the Charlie Brown Christmas Special does. Even if you don’t think that that is the true meaning of Christmas, I always love at the end when Linus says “peace, goodwill towards men.”

Happy holidays to this queen who insisted on getting in my selfie

In all seriousness though, I love Christmas time and I love my family, who always make it special. I sat on my couch on Christmas morning, hemmed in by a bunch of really great gifts, because I am not a humble beggar who has any problem asking for what she wants. 

So happy holidays. I hope you have peace, and goodwill towards men (and women and those outside the binary).

The Tragic Queen,

Raquel

P.S.: Check out how I kicked off the holiday season, when I went to go and see my first ever burlesque show.

Burlesque

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Before going home for the holidays, I watched my first ever burlesque show at The Slipper Room on the Lower East Side.

It was a festive holiday burlesque show, presided over by a woman wearing a thong and knee-high socks, who was ready to show us “the reason for the season.” 

This was not the kind of burlesque show where the women wore Santa hats and have tassels hanging from their nipples, but the kind where the women do trapeze stunts over the audience.

I spent the evening with a good cocktail and a nice date, watching half-naked women fling themselves through the air like it was nothing and then unravel onto the stage. 

My favorite performer was a woman who was dressed like Eve, which is to say that she was in a nude bodysuit wrapped in fake ivy, as she swung from the rafters with an apple in her mouth while the song “MOTHER ATE” played. For those unfamiliar, MOTHER ATE contains the lyrics “crazy how the very first sin was a woman who ate” and “devoured, no crumbs left in sight.”

Another woman hung from her hair and acted like it was nothing, even though I had a headache just looking at her. 

I felt like I did when I was 14 and watched a street performer in Italy hula-hoop with a ring that was lit on fire. I was impressed by the talent and the artistry, with a dangerous sense of “I could do that.” 

“I could wind up in the hospital” is more likely. 

There was a puppet show. The poodle puppet was wearing cheetah print pants, a cheetah print coat, and black, knee-high boots. I have that exact outfit at home.

I’d had other plans for the night and seeing the burlesque show ended up being my back up. It’s not often that you think you’re going to see a movie and then end up watching women hanging from silks while a Chapell Roan song plays. 

The Tragic Queen,

Raquel