Post Holiday Blah

Does anyone else seem to get this the day after Christmas? Or a few days after even?  I have a love/hate relationship with the Post Holidays.  And yes, I meant to make Holidays plural because I have been going non-stop since October with holiday celebration.  Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas.  I love to decorate for each season, and I try to make the most out it.  It takes time to decorate and lots of money to buy or make decorations so I try to get as much as I can out of it.  My fall decor goes up the first day of September. Then Halloween decor the first day of October, and etc.  So, the reason why I hate it when Christmas is over? Because it's just over. Back to work, back to a messy house (which I try to have it clean every year before we leave but it never seems to happen) and time to un-decorate.  You spend the whole month of December (or more) shopping, baking, (eating) going to Christmas parties, sending out cards, wrapping gifts, getting all worked up and excited for your kids, and then it comes and it's fun, and happy, and most people are off work and it's just family time. Then it's over and back to the real world, and this: see below.  Do you see this sad, dead tree?  This is the main thing I hate about real trees, is they die.  And they die fast.  They don't seem to understand my drawn out, make-things-last, get-your-money's-worth concept.  We usually get about two weeks of beauty before they dry up and droop and become a fire hazard.  I want at least five weeks. (I don't like taking my tree down until after the New Year)  But I do love having a real tree, with the beauty and the smell, and the tradition...(for Buck at least, we always had a fake tree) But I like taking on his tradition of getting a real tree.

The tree has drooped and sagged so much that the ornaments are touching the floor, complete with multiple fatalities as they fall off entirely, and shatter.

And the Angel, she looks like she's had a few too many spiked eggnogs up there.  And then I'm just over it.  Over Christmas altogether.  I get home and I want the tree out, (which is the worst, you have to wear a bee-keeper suit just to keep from getting stabbed to death by all the dead, dry pine needles) Christmas music is no more, same with Christmas movies, even the cinnamon wax scents, all of it has to go.  And all of a sudden all that snow you wished for to make it a beautiful, white Christmas, turns into the devil and you start cursing and complaining about all the white-ness you just wished for.

This is what the entire house looks like after taking the tree out, and you end up cleaning pine needles out of everything until at least June.  That's the hate part of it.  Then there's the love part of it.  I love the new beginning, and the fact that things do tend to slow down, a little.  I get to clean everything up really well, put the house back to its normal decor, and I don't have to do any more blasted shopping for anyone, except maybe groceries. (I love giving gifts, just hate shopping for them)  You finally get to listen to your regular music station on Pandora, and you don't have to go to parties, or make treats, and maybe even detox from all the holiday food you just consumed. (Or maybe just me, little miss no-self-control over here)
I usually pull out of my funk once the New Year holiday is over. I make New Year's Resolutions that I never keep and set goals I never reach, and get excited and look forward to what this next year has in store.  Which is basically only one thing for me: school.

I call this blah, Post-Event Depression.  It's when you look forward to something for a while and prepare for it and build up to it, and then it finally comes and you feel like you waited forever. Then it's all done and over with and you feel lost having nothing to build up to, and prepare for, not knowing what to do with all the time you suddenly seem to have. I get this after Christmas, vacations, birthdays, etc.  It only lasts a day or two for me, because I start looking for the next thing to get excited for.  (Don't get me wrong, this isn't a serious thing, I'm not depressed or anything)  And I really am looking forward to the new year and all the new things and challenges it will hold.