I remember the exact day the 2023 holiday season started for me. I was in a local big box store; the one that maintains a steady stream of customers through the front door, as well as an exit-line wait that must be patiently endured before leaving. Both are indicators, it would seem, of this store’s solid fan base. 

I don’t shop there on a regular basis, but every once in a while, I find it necessary to fill my cabinets with 90 rolls of toilet paper at one time. When that happens, I pull out my 17-year-old membership card, dislodge a shopping cart the size of a small kitchen table and carefully merge into the uninterrupted flow of humanity funneling in and out of the doors. Which is just what I did on that summer day back in 2023.

Deep inside the store, I found myself wedged in the granola bar section with little space to maneuver. I was unsuccessfully trying to make my way to the one-and-a-half pound container of jalapeño-pimento cheese I had overlooked six aisles back. This backtrack necessitated an upstream travel route and, as such, I was feeling anxious. Making a move, I inched my cart around a 6-foot tower of protein powder and stopped abruptly. There in front of me was a display of sparkly ribbons. I don’t think kids were even back in school at that time, but right then and there, the 2023 holiday season officially began.

I hear a lot of talk about the annoying trend of retail outlets ushering in the holidays earlier and earlier every year. Growing up, we had a fake tree with individual clusters of limbs, each one with a tip painted a different color, designating where on the tree it belonged. I don’t remember us having a set date for putting our tree up every year, but I can state with full authority that it was never assembled before Thanksgiving; and never, ever before December.

As an adult with my own household, I tried for a long time to intentionally delay any December-themed activities like this, ensuring that Thanksgiving remained independent and free-standing.

But a lot has changed since then. In the span of just a few years, my husband and I lost a mother, a father, three grandparents and two dogs. And in what sometimes feels like a bait and switch, the kids seemingly grew up overnight. I can hardly keep up with the new speed with which my internal clock measures time, especially during the holiday season.

This year, I’m not sure I’ll get to do everything I look forward to doing most holidays. The addition of in-laws, new jobs and changed addresses make for a bit of uncertainty in regard to our once-predictable family traditions. What I do know for sure is that one day soon I will drag my holiday tubs out of the attic and, in the blink of an eye, December will be over, and I’ll be lugging them back into storage for another year. So I’ve got no time to dilly-dally with self-imposed delays.

With this in mind, I snuck in a little preemptive holiday spirit earlier this year, just in case December proves too short to hold all that I envision. In July, I hung a strand of twinkly lights across my kitchen island, organized a white elephant gift exchange and asked everyone in my family to clear their calendars for one night so we could be together for a few uninterrupted hours. All of this was wonderfully festive, but what really set the tone for our make-shift merriment was the playlist. It was a 100 degrees outside and the air conditioner was running full blast, but as soon as those familiar tunes filled the air, the climate in my household changed. A routine summer cookout turned into a precious, albeit early, holiday memory. As I think about what I need in order to prepare for whatever this year’s holiday season may hold, I think back to my big box store visit last summer. Obviously, the answer to what I need is sparkly ribbon. Lots of it. In fact, it might prove to be the only thing I’ll end up controlling at all this year. So today, while still firmly rooted in autumn, I give myself permission to go ahead and unspool those ribbons with abandon. In fact, I think I’ll use some to tie a big bow around Alexa; an appropriate adornment I think, as she gets a head start on filling my house with holiday happiness.