So, I just got back from my local Winners with about 4 new pairs of tights (a short skirt and tights is all the rage this winter). While I was shopping I noticed the steady stream of Christmas music being blast over the speakers. Here comes Santa Clause, y’all I hope you are ready. He’s on his fucking sleigh and is getting ready to park it at the Canadian Tire. I don’t mean to sound so angry about it (that’s bull shit I totally mean to sound angry) but every year that goes by, the holiday season just gets more and more plastic.

I think for me, the last straw was when various radio stations in Toronto started playing Christmas music 24/7 from the first week in November. I don’t know where this trend started but it inspired various musicians to write all new Christmas carols meat to turn your bowels. Here’s a ditty we can all vomit to! The one that really stands out in my head is a song called “Christmas Shoes” or something like that. The song is about a young boy who was sent to the store on Christmas Eve to buy new Christmas shoes for his hospitalized mother who needs the shoes to wear when she meets baby Jesus (her death was imminent). The kid was only a couple dollars short so he tells the story of his death-doorstep-mother inspiring charity in the person standing behind him in line. No one in the song wondered why an eight-year-old would be sent to the mall alone on Christmas Eve while his mother lay dying in the hospital, but sentimental drivel has no reason.

I heard that Christmas shoes song a couple years ago while at the salon. For some reason Middle aged Caribbean women love that shit. They are all over the Christmas music 24 hours a day – especially if there is a steel drum involved. While getting my haircut I sat beside a family friend who for the purposes of this blog shall be known as Darleen, mainly because that is her name. Darleen sat in the chair talking at length about how much she loved the Christmas music on the radio – The family thinks Darleen is, in the Guyanese parlance, a “schupidy gyirl.” Directly translated, that means Darleen is an idiot. She sat there complaining that while the music was nice they didn’t play enough Johnny Mathis. That’s when the radio DJ dropped Christmas Shoes. Perhaps, inadvisably, I say “Oh Jesus Christ this has got to be the worst song I have ever heard.” Darleen was aghast, “What do you mean? This is a very nice song.” Darleen said looking at me like I was a cold-hearted heathen. How could I not be touched by the story of a young boy about to loose his mother on Christmas? Then Darleen started swaying to and fro to the insipid melody while trying to sing along. Since she didn’t know the words she did her best to anticipate what they might be but mostly just sang along with monosyllables. Great, I had succeeded in making a bad situation worse. I lived the worst year of my life in that three and a half minutes.

Anyway, at the Winners the Christmas music was especially bad. After Shania Twain’s rendition of “White Christmas” (a song that always creeped me out) another song was played that I can only describe as painful. And when I say painful I mean it sounded like the moaning of a French woman in pain, specifically a dull throbbing pain. It had that unmistakable Christmas sound to it, much like the Christmas smell that takes over malls and department stores. I don’t know how this woman got a record deal, but she did and now I am being punished.

At least, since I don’t listen to the radio, I don’t have to worry about being inundated with bad Christmas music. My pre-Christmas resolution is to stay far away from the mall.
- posted by Debbie @ 5:18 PM