The Emotional Labor of The Festive Season

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Abstract

ell as nice.</p><p id="9841">A few years ago we stopped doing holiday cards because I simply got tired of orchestrating it all. James would write some of them out, but I had to decide if we were using a picture and place the order or otherwise select cards, I’d buy the stamps, make the list, write the bulk of the cards, and take the completed cards to the post office. I like hearing from friends and feel a bit bad that we don’t reciprocate, but not bad enough to undertake that all again.</p><p id="bbce">I work from home and have two part-time jobs, not including the unpaid job of being the main manager of our lives and household. However, since James has retired, he has taken on a lot more of these duties. After many, many years of being the one to do the bulk of holiday-making, I’m tired and just don’t have the bandwidth for it that I used to. It’s not that I don’t like the holiday season; it’s that I didn’t like being the one who had to ensure that it all happened.</p><p id="b89f">Back when we were newlyweds, I enjoyed going all out. I didn’t particularly like my office job, so at least I had the creative outlet and enjoyment of making our home look festive. When we were first married, it was the heyday of Martha Stewart. I cooked her recipes and crafted her projects in part because it was fun, but also in part because I thought that I should. That’s a part of what being a good wife and holiday hostess meant, or so we were led to believe.</p><p id="94c9">I do actually enjoy having people over and treating my guests with real hospitality, but at this juncture, we just don’t do it very much anymore because I have pretty much run out of steam. A college friend who was visiting a few months back asked me how we decorate for Christmas and I told her that if it weren’t for our son, I’d probably put a wreath on the door, a few decorations on the mantle and be done with it. As it stands, we do a bit more because it makes the rest of the family happy, but not all that much more.</p><p id="e601">Last Thanksgiving day while James was trying to cook, he kept getting interrupted by texts from friends and colleagues wishing him well. I pointed out to him that probably the vast majority of those guys were sitting on the sofa with a beer, chatting to their guests and watching TV while the women in their family were in the kitchen doing the bulk of the food prep. I got zero texts from my friends and colleagues that day. Most of them were probably in the kitchen, creating a nice holiday for their families.</p><p id="5dcc">I’m not saying that women do everything and men do nothing around the holidays because that we would be too big a generalization, but in every family that I know, whether they celebrate Christmas or some other holiday(s), it’s the women who pretty much make it happen. And there are probably some women who honestly just love to do all of that. But I’m also going to bet that there are a lot of women out there like me who do more than they’d really like to, for the sake of their kids, for the benefit of their families and be

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cause they think that they somehow should, even though they also work and have other priorities as well.</p><p id="9e1c">Creating a holiday atmosphere is not inherently “women’s work” and there’s nothing that says that women have to spearhead or undertake that. My point is that it would be great if more men took more initiative this time of year, not just by asking what needs to be done, but by noticing what needs to be done and taking care of it unasked. That’s a gift that is truly appreciated! The help that I’ve gotten from James already this year has made it a lot more fun than the past several years.</p><p id="5eaa">If you aren’t the one in your house doing the holiday planning, here are some suggestions of ways to take some of the burden off the person who is:</p><ul><li>Take inventory of the wrapping paper, bags, bows and other related supplies and determine if your family needs more. If needed, go buy some.</li><li>Take over as the point person on the holiday cards.</li><li>Ask your children if they are going to have holiday parties at school and what each child needs to contribute to that. Buy or make that together and ensure that it gets to school on the correct day.</li><li>Coordinate with your extended family about who is going where on what day and what your family needs to contribute to each event. Make arrangements for that to happen, either by buying or making it, or by asking someone else to do so.</li><li>Divide gift buying and wrapping duties.</li><li>If there are aspects of the holidays that you really don’t care about, have a conversation around that with your family and see where you can agree to pare things down.</li><li>Thank the person who has been doing the bulk of the creating the holidays all of this time, and make a plan together to have an even more collaborative season next year.</li></ul><div id="b944" class="link-block"> <a href="https://readmedium.com/you-need-a-relationship-agreement-497046a1a628"> <div> <div> <h2>You Need A Relationship Agreement</h2> <div><h3>And maybe even a “baby prenup”</h3></div> <div><p>medium.com</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/1*3ned7frKbPX0s7Z9kpM6bw.jpeg)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div><div id="aedc" class="link-block"> <a href="https://readmedium.com/you-have-to-take-people-for-who-they-are-95-of-the-time-98b3c0b63a12"> <div> <div> <h2>You Have To Take People For Who They Are 95% Of The Time</h2> <div><h3>If you can’t, you are the one who is the problem</h3></div> <div><p>medium.com</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/0*5hRIYI9YWZ5ZvPZz)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div></article></body>

The Emotional Labor of The Festive Season

Who creates the holidays?

Who creates the holidays? I’m not talking about religious institutions or Madison Avenue here. I mean who creates a festive atmosphere in your life for whatever holidays that you celebrate? I’m going to bet that for the most part it’s the woman or women in your life and that if you are a woman, it’s in large part up to you. Not just to do the vast majority of the execution, but also to do planning as well: making lists, buying and wrapping gifts, writing cards, planning meals and parties, putting up decorations, making sure that teachers have gifts and that cookies are baked for school celebrations, etc., etc. This is what’s known as emotional labor.

Women already perform the bulk of emotional labor ― the psychological phenomenon of unpaid, often unnoticed labor that goes into keeping everyone around you comfortable and happy. But during the holidays, this work ramps up. There are more mental lists to juggle, more commitments on the calendar to keep track of, more tasks to delegate. There is more pressure to make things magical for those around you. It takes a lot of unseen and underappreciated effort to keep everything humming along smoothly.

My husband James took up gourmet cooking about 10 years ago and so he now does all of our holiday meals, although in the past I have bought the ingredients, set and decorated the table, assisted him in the kitchen and done all of the dishes. Up until 10 years ago, I did all of that. Last year James also put up the tree all by himself, which is something that we typically do together, although I’m still the one who does the bulk of the decorating.

When we were first married and both had full time out of the home jobs, I would have to pick out the tree by myself and lug it home because he worked so much. We used to joke about how I’d have to co-opt some stranger into holding it upright for me so that I could inspect it from a few feet back for size and symmetry. As much as I love a live tree, we both hate messing with the lights, so several years back we solved that by getting a pre-lit artificial tree, which does streamline things just a little bit, although it doesn’t look or smell as nice.

A few years ago we stopped doing holiday cards because I simply got tired of orchestrating it all. James would write some of them out, but I had to decide if we were using a picture and place the order or otherwise select cards, I’d buy the stamps, make the list, write the bulk of the cards, and take the completed cards to the post office. I like hearing from friends and feel a bit bad that we don’t reciprocate, but not bad enough to undertake that all again.

I work from home and have two part-time jobs, not including the unpaid job of being the main manager of our lives and household. However, since James has retired, he has taken on a lot more of these duties. After many, many years of being the one to do the bulk of holiday-making, I’m tired and just don’t have the bandwidth for it that I used to. It’s not that I don’t like the holiday season; it’s that I didn’t like being the one who had to ensure that it all happened.

Back when we were newlyweds, I enjoyed going all out. I didn’t particularly like my office job, so at least I had the creative outlet and enjoyment of making our home look festive. When we were first married, it was the heyday of Martha Stewart. I cooked her recipes and crafted her projects in part because it was fun, but also in part because I thought that I should. That’s a part of what being a good wife and holiday hostess meant, or so we were led to believe.

I do actually enjoy having people over and treating my guests with real hospitality, but at this juncture, we just don’t do it very much anymore because I have pretty much run out of steam. A college friend who was visiting a few months back asked me how we decorate for Christmas and I told her that if it weren’t for our son, I’d probably put a wreath on the door, a few decorations on the mantle and be done with it. As it stands, we do a bit more because it makes the rest of the family happy, but not all that much more.

Last Thanksgiving day while James was trying to cook, he kept getting interrupted by texts from friends and colleagues wishing him well. I pointed out to him that probably the vast majority of those guys were sitting on the sofa with a beer, chatting to their guests and watching TV while the women in their family were in the kitchen doing the bulk of the food prep. I got zero texts from my friends and colleagues that day. Most of them were probably in the kitchen, creating a nice holiday for their families.

I’m not saying that women do everything and men do nothing around the holidays because that we would be too big a generalization, but in every family that I know, whether they celebrate Christmas or some other holiday(s), it’s the women who pretty much make it happen. And there are probably some women who honestly just love to do all of that. But I’m also going to bet that there are a lot of women out there like me who do more than they’d really like to, for the sake of their kids, for the benefit of their families and because they think that they somehow should, even though they also work and have other priorities as well.

Creating a holiday atmosphere is not inherently “women’s work” and there’s nothing that says that women have to spearhead or undertake that. My point is that it would be great if more men took more initiative this time of year, not just by asking what needs to be done, but by noticing what needs to be done and taking care of it unasked. That’s a gift that is truly appreciated! The help that I’ve gotten from James already this year has made it a lot more fun than the past several years.

If you aren’t the one in your house doing the holiday planning, here are some suggestions of ways to take some of the burden off the person who is:

Take inventory of the wrapping paper, bags, bows and other related supplies and determine if your family needs more. If needed, go buy some.

Take over as the point person on the holiday cards.

Ask your children if they are going to have holiday parties at school and what each child needs to contribute to that. Buy or make that together and ensure that it gets to school on the correct day.

Coordinate with your extended family about who is going where on what day and what your family needs to contribute to each event. Make arrangements for that to happen, either by buying or making it, or by asking someone else to do so.

Divide gift buying and wrapping duties.

If there are aspects of the holidays that you really don’t care about, have a conversation around that with your family and see where you can agree to pare things down.

Thank the person who has been doing the bulk of the creating the holidays all of this time, and make a plan together to have an even more collaborative season next year.