The members of my family on the larger scope, as far as I am more closely related to them, have come to the mutual agreement that christmas does not need to equal a requirement to go crazy and shop the hell out of the world in order to have some material present for everyone and to go binge eating all over the place until you've done it with everyone no matter how remote the relationship is. Appreciation can be communicated in other, less concentrated and more temporarily distributed ways if the people involved are willing to - and it saves not only me from experiencing this forced, materialistic massacre christmas more and more seems to have devolved into.

In remembrance of the fact that the christmas tree has its origin in older beliefs - I'm fine!