Christmas Past: What We Lost, What We’re Chasing, and What Still Matters
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There was a time when Christmas didn’t feel like a competition. No one was trying to out-decorate the neighbors, nobody needed a second mortgage to buy a few toys, and you didn’t have to battle a Black Friday crowd like you were entering an arena of caffeinated gladiators.
Christmas in the '60s, '70s, and '80s felt different. It moved at a slower, softer pace, and honestly, it was sweeter.
Kids got excited about things we’d laugh at.
An orange in a stocking.
A Slinky.
A plastic doll whose hair you could pull out of her head like some sort of cheerful nightmare.
And the joy? It was huge. Nuclear-level huge. Because the magic wasn’t in the price tag — it was in the moment.
An orange in a stocking.
A Slinky.
A plastic doll whose hair you could pull out of her head like some sort of cheerful nightmare.
And the joy? It was huge. Nuclear-level huge. Because the magic wasn’t in the price tag — it was in the moment.
Back then, families weren’t perfect, bills still needed paying, and the world wasn’t a fairytale. But there was a kind of innocence in the season, one we didn’t notice until it was gone.
Today, Christmas feels heavier.
Overpriced everything.
Cost of living that punches harder each year.
Kids asking for things that need software updates.
And adults exhausted from trying to keep everything “merry and bright” while juggling real-life realities that the Hallmark Channel politely pretends don’t exist.
Overpriced everything.
Cost of living that punches harder each year.
Kids asking for things that need software updates.
And adults exhausted from trying to keep everything “merry and bright” while juggling real-life realities that the Hallmark Channel politely pretends don’t exist.
Somewhere along the road, the season got louder, bigger, and somehow emptier. We traded simplicity for excess, magic for marketing. And we all feel it — that ache for normalcy, for ease, for the way holidays used to wrap around us like a warm blanket instead of a weighted one.
But here’s the part I refuse to let go of:
The core of Christmas never actually left.
It just got covered up by receipts, obligations, and noise.
It just got covered up by receipts, obligations, and noise.
Magic still happens in the small moments.
the soft glow of lights on a quiet night,
the sound of someone you love laughing in the kitchen,
the way a simple gift can still hit harder than anything expensive,
the feeling of belonging, even if life is messy as hell.
the soft glow of lights on a quiet night,
the sound of someone you love laughing in the kitchen,
the way a simple gift can still hit harder than anything expensive,
the feeling of belonging, even if life is messy as hell.
We can’t rewind to the 60s, 70s, or 80s.
We can’t bring back the innocence that came with cheaper living, simpler toys, and slower days.
We can’t bring back the innocence that came with cheaper living, simpler toys, and slower days.
But we can do this:
Choose the parts worth keeping.
Choose the slower moments.
Choose the people who matter.
Choose the connection over the cost.
Choose the joy that doesn’t require a credit card.
Choose the slower moments.
Choose the people who matter.
Choose the connection over the cost.
Choose the joy that doesn’t require a credit card.
And little by little, it adds up — a quiet kind of normalcy, not the kind we lost, but the kind we can build again.
Because the truth is, Christmas isn’t gone.
It’s just waiting for us to notice it again.
It’s just waiting for us to notice it again.