The Christmas Shoes

Most drama in our lives is really rather squalid.
Tom Baker

I realize that I am probably going to hell for this, but I HATE the song "The Christmas Shoes." Every time I hear those first few piano cords, I change the channel on the radio. Sometimes I come in on those last few saccharine little kid words, and I shudder uncontrollably. I almost wrecked this morning trying to get to the channel selection buttons when they snuck it in on my while I was half asleep.

It's hard to put my finger on why a song most people regard as a staple of the Christmas holidays, a deeply moving and semi-religious experience, makes my teeth ache. Maybe it's the same thing I hate about really sad country songs. It's not that I doubt the original sentiment of the song. It's that I think it's crass to take that emotion and try to make a buck off it.

Yes, it's sad. It's impossibly sad. It disturbs me, though, that this type of thing always becomes so terribly popular. Are we all so hungry for a publicly-sanctioned form of catharsis that we have to take it in huge, artificially sweetened, heavy air-play rotation doses? To me, it cheapens the original sentiment that inspired the song. Seeing every woman in an entire beauty shop tearing up while turning the volume on the shop radio to maximum so it can be heard over the dryers is just somehow repulsive to me.

I know this isn't a world-shattering issue. Most people probably either disagree or don't care. I just hope that I can get through the rest of the holiday season without having to hear that melodramatic song again.