At the risk of being called a Scrooge, can someone tell me why we feel the need to be nice to each other at this time of year?

Look, if I don't like you, I don't like you. I have very good reasons for not liking you. I don't just decide to not like people for the hell of it. And it doesn't matter how many X-mas cards or gestures of friendship or StarBucks gift certificates you send me, that ain't gonna change. Just because some candles magicly burned without oil, or some supposed Virgin gave birth to a little dude 2000 years ago (and did you know that Virgin was Aramaic for "Nun" and that Nuns routinely were allowed to have sex with their betrothed before the wedding, as they could only be married in certain places and the trip was long and arduous?), it doesn't mean that you've all of a sudden become a better person.

There is a lot about this season that sickens me. Everyone runs around with a "Happy Holidays," on their lips but they'll fight over parking spaces at the malls. They send out X-mas cards to people they haven't bothered to speak with in years. They overspend like mad little consumers in order to make sure that Johnny--who beat up two little kids and flipped off his teacher this year--has a new Xbox.

And they loathe the thought of spending the holidays with their family.

Is there something wrong with this picture?

I'll spend the holiday with people I love. I won't send you a X-mas card. I won't offer my hand to you in friendship if you've been an asshole all year long.

The people I love get all of my love. Ask any one of them. I don't love half-heartedly. The people I don't like get just the opposite.

Because January comes soon enough, and you'll be pulling the same shit once again. Let's not pretend.

Whaddayasay?

Joseph Haines, signing off from The Edge of The Abyss.