Too much of a good thing

SO you’re probably back to work today and doubtless a colleague or two will pose the perennial Irish question: so how did you get over the Christmas?

Notice the phrasing. Not ‘did you enjoy Christmas’ or ‘how was your Christmas’, but ‘how did you get over’: as if Christmas itself is an endurance test and now that the fake drunken bonhomie and disappointed present-giving is over, we can finally admit it.

For a festival which is uniform in so many ways, people have an astounding array of opinions about which bit they like. Some like the build-up, but not the day. Or vice versa. Or that quiet week between Christmas and New Year’s Day. Some will have loved ringing in 2013. Others will have ignored it.

Few will claim they are sorry it’s over. Because the dirty little secret of Christmas is that those of us who have jobs are mostly glad to get back to them: to get away from our families.

Google the words ‘stress’ and ‘Christmas’ and you get back over 54 million hits: there’s an industry in advising people how to deal with what is supposed to be the happiest time of the year.

It is an odd contradiction of human nature. We all like giving or getting presents, having a few drinks and eating a nice dinner. We all love being with our families. Yet when we get to do all those things at the same time, all the time, it can quickly become unendurable.

Not that you want to admit this to yourself, of course. So a bit of self-flagellation is in order. January is the month of joining gyms or giving up food, cigarettes, alcohol. You resolve to paint the house or sort out the garden or read more books: almost as if, by making the start of the year as grim and ascetic as possible, Christmas might seem enjoyable by comparison.

Thankfully such life-changing regimes rarely last too long. Because what Christmas teaches us is that the old cliché isn’t true: you can have too much of a good thing. An overload of food, family and enforced jolliness sends the soul and body into shock.

If living is an art form, then balance must be the key. For your New Year’s resolution, consider not getting so excited about everything next Christmas. And in the meantime, try and be a bit more festive every day. Just not too much.