I feel it in my fingers...

When I moved here, I knew I was going to live in a different time zone, but no one warned me that living on “American time” will also mean that the week will start with Sunday instead of Monday; daylight saving time will come a week later than it is supposed to; that mid-November-Thanksgiving starts around Halloween, in late October, and Santa starts knocking on doors before most Americans recover from their ten course Turkey-day dinners. I am seriously afraid, that on Christmas Eve people will be celebrating New Year’s Eve...
I have the feeling that I jumped not only a time zone but a month zone too. I usually feel that Christmas comes a little earlier each and every year as it is supposed to. But here, it came brutally early. I started to hear Christmas carols and see red-white-and-green decorations a month and a half before the Big Day which eventually coincided with Halloween, creating a slight holiday décor traffic jam of Superman costumes, Thanksgiving pumpkin pies and red nosed reindeers.
At first I was distressed as most of us, gift sprinters, who do Christmas shopping on the day before and spend the entire pre-holiday week under the familiar mid-December chronic stress. Why on earth can’t they leave me alone in early November with hip-swinging Santas, and glossy Happy Hanuka postcards? Naively I thought it was my inalienable right to maintain my bad habit of last minute present-hunt.
Well, not in this country. Especially not in this city. And particularly not in my case, working in the same building with the fanciest shopping mall in NY. Time Warner Center (TWC) has its pros and cons. Normally, lots of pros and few cons. Well, in December, the cons seem to triumph as TWC happens to be the second most favorite destination of my beloved British shopping tourists. I have been under constant attack of all the tacky holiday décor-wonders the most expensive shopping mall in NY has to offer for more than a month now.
At first the Nutcracker offensive seasoned with jolly jingle bells assaults made me want to organize my own little “Remember? Santa’s coming to town in DE-CEM-BER!” protest movement…then as time flew by and I learned all the Christmas songs by heart, bought couple of presents 3 weeks earlier than I was used to, (partially alleviating the severe pre-12/24 symptoms, by the way) I realized, how much I was enjoying the abundance of colorful lights, flashy shop windows and holiday edition gingerbread lattes.
Obviously, now that the streetlights go on almost midday and my winter coat becomes my second skin it all makes much more sense than a month ago. And I can’t say it bothers me that I could smell those wonderful pine trees piled up neatly on the street on my way back home either. Extending the best 2-day Holiday of the year into a 2-month event is not a bad thing, really. After all, it’s about that dusty, old 4 letter word, that so many people seem to have forgotten about here. Love, actually. So if you can enjoy all the fun stuff it comes with its Big Day for a little longer, why not?