The Grinch

I am the grinch of the festive season, and in particular this day. I dislike christmas. I realise that I always have, from being a very small child. Everyone thinks that Christmas is a time when adults feel most stressed, but as a child, there is always the pressure to appear grateful but not too happy wallowing in consumerism. Or to love your family and at the same time show them a lot of gratitude; it's all bound up in gift reception, which I have never been too good at, being emotionally barren.

So, I got some lovely things. I got clothes and books. I like the books. But I dislike receiving presents for three reasons:
1. Having to react. I hate that my reaction will be judged and give people joy or otherwise; I feel I dissapoint. I'm honestly not fussed about gifts and I think the effort people go to to get me them is diminished by my pleasure in receiving them.
2. There are people starving that need food more than I need another book.
3. This year, my parents have bought me size 12 clothing from Marks and Spencers, tops. This is a generously sized brand. And they bought me a 12. They usually buy a ten. This is so petty and trivial, but I hate that they think I have become fatter. This means that every time I eat they must be watching and thinking how disgusting I am. Not that they've said it but the quiet admiration they used to have, so long ago, has disappeared. I am a fatty.

But I enjoyed our dinner, and the shoes I got. And I received necessary things, like music and books and a sewing machine. Despite my hatred of consumerism, I do love clothes and art. When does art become consumerist? I do believe that art should be one of the things you spend money on, however, in giving it value we take away artistic credence, as there is a motivator other than that of producing art. I would like to live as a living work of art, but realise that in order to do this I should have to consume.

Anyway, I cannot yet use a sewing machine but I shall learn. I shall create clothes and they shall be good.

It all just seems so extraneous and unnecessary. I don't want presents, I don't want all this food or all this fuss, but it's foisted upon us all anyway. All anyone really needs is enough food to survive and love. A cliche. All this pampering is just so uncomfortably dry and heinous, it just makes me sick that we rush round like headless chickens buying things we don't need when we could all go to charity shops and feed the world instead. Why do we need wealth? What does anyone ever do with it? Travel, yes, that's important. Buy huge houses. But who needs a huge house? Who really truly needs a fleet of butlers? Who needs Hello and OK and social pressure? It will never make you happy. What would make me happy is if lots of other people were able to live happily, and by that I mean probably what we would classify as dire poverty in Britain. Can you imagine giving an organisation like the NHS to Africa? Think of the impact! I need that, I need to know people aren't dying needlessly, instead of a teddy and some bath salts in a plastic bathtub. The excess of it sickens me. I am glad it's over.

However, I have eaten ridiculous things, such as today, boxing day. I had two slices of toast and marmite, nine liqourice allsorts, two cubes of galaxy, an apple, a chocolate mint, some pineapple juice a galaxy ripple, 75g of coleslaw and some banana toffee. I think about 25g. See, I just keep picking at bits. That is my problem, I just need to leave well alone. My family is eating turkey sandwiches but as a result of eating the crap I am not joining them, which suits me well as I dislike turkey. I had some yesterday, but I don't like the look of it. I am pedantic as a result of being pandered to by consumerism and prepackaged pulverized meats. When it lies there, in all its glory, it's as if it shouts at me, "yes! Look at my bones and sinews! I was once alive too! You're eating muscle and skin, muscle and skin!" I like the taste. I don't think we should eat meat on the grounds that there are more humane proteinous replacements. But I still eat it, in acceptable forms that don't look like meat. I cannot stand the idea that I am eating sinew and bone and muscle. So, I cauterize and chop off every reminder, not touching it with my hands and barely managing with cutlery- I sliver off the greasy skin, all pimpled, and put it away from my plate. The little squiggle of red vein, that is chopped out with a border around it, a grisly reminder that blood flowed in abundance. And then, when I have my slice of meat, all white and pure and never alive, then I can eat it peacefully.

I also dislike crusts. Bread crusts. They are too much effort to chew, they posess none of the filling of the sandwich, they are burnt and pointless. So I remove them before I eat my sandwich or my toast. You could put your jaw out chewing toast.

All this is a distraction from my work that I should be doing. I so desperately want not to fail. If I don't start I won't get confused or fail. But that is a paradox because if I start I have a chance of not failing, if I never start the work is not there and I fail anyway. But my work does not fail, my intellect has not failed, because it refuses to be judged. So that is why I do not work. But I will, in time.