Trunk Day

The year we first moved out of our parents’ homes and into our first place together, we bought all kinds of new Christmas decorations. And we kept them conveniently stored in the trunk of our car. We kept them there until the joyous day we had decreed that we would take them into the house and decorate. The day we called… Trunk Day.

Trunk Day falls every year on December 1^st, or the closest reasonable day for putting in the time it takes to decorate. Work nights aren’t always ideal, and sometimes we have other plans, so sometimes it’s a little late. In 2020 and 2021 we held it early because in the last couple of years we have felt that we could use a little cheer a little earlier. This year it is to be held the weekend after December 1^st because that is what is convenient.

Usually there is takeout. Usually there is the first Christmas movie of the year (there will be many more). Usually, it’s the day we start playing the Christmas playlist (sometimes we get a head start on this one). Maybe we’ll fill up our Advent calendar (which says HAPPY HOGSWATCH across the top). Sometimes there is a gingerbread house to decorate. Always, though, always there are the tree, the lights, the ornaments, the stockings (lately filled with just letters to each other but we put them up anyway), and random things collected over the years like a Christmas-themed Baby Groot. This is Trunk Day.

I’m telling you about Trunk Day because I think rituals are important to mental health. For one thing, I find that having something, a thing with a date or a time, to look forward to, takes the edge off my existential angst. But even the boring rituals, like, for example, brushing your teeth and washing your face, have a role in creating structure. They divide the rest of life into more manageable chunks. And in the case of the more enjoyable ones, like Trunk Day, they’re built-in rewards for getting through those more difficult bits of life. Rituals keep all the gears of our lives spinning along so we don’t get stuck.¹

Occasionally Trunk Day starts out feeling like a chore. Looking at those decorations that have to go on the tree, sometimes I just feel tired. Particularly if I’m already tired. Lucky for me, though, I’m not alone at the Trunk Day festivities, and Adam and I take turns coaxing each other into participating, when we need that.

But truly, I’m looking forward Trunk Day for a lot of reasons. One of the strongest is its reliability. Hallowe’en in recent years? No parties, no costumes, no kids at the door, just a box of ecologically unfriendly packaging on bits of chocolate. And Hallowe’en is one of my very favourite celebrations, so this has been devastating. But Trunk Day? Timing is slightly flexible, the menu is set, the activities are easy to organize and don’t rely on me having the ability to go out somewhere at a particular time, all we have to do is pick a movie and we have ages to do that (it’s not unusual to be discussing it in the summer). For me, this is a reliable ritual.

It’s also the first sign of my Christmas. I don’t particularly mean the commercial or the religious version of Christmas. I mean the cheerful, cozy things that I gift myself for getting to the end of another difficult year. Reading Terry Pratchett’s Hogfather.² Watching an unhealthy number of Hallmark (and similar) movies. Listening to my Christmas playlist. Spending time with family without worrying about what comes next. (I worry about what I’m supposed to be doing next so much of the time.) Making Breton Brittle with zero guilt. Decorating Christmas cookies. Enjoying test my mother’s stollen test runs. Celebrating Trunk Day.

Fun fact: “Snow Globe,” the song currently on the front page of the website, grew out of a true Trunk Day happening when, mid-pandemic, one of the lights on our tree failed to keep up with the rest of them. In the spirit of Trunk Day, maybe you’ll feel inclined to give it a listen.

—

¹ For an interesting read on ritual in a secular framework, check out For Small Creatures Such as We: Rituals for Finding Meaning in Our Unlikely World, by Sasha Sagan. I listened to the audiobook (read by the author) and then I was so excited about it that Adam and I listened together.

² Hogfather is my Christmas book.³ I’ve read it more times than I’ve read any other novel, I’m sure. I read it every December. In some particularly challenging years, I haven’t managed to finish it by Christmas. Other years I’ve finished early and not known what to do with myself next. In recent years, we’ve listened to the audiobook together, and that’s a kind of special way to read it as well. Our eyes meet after all the best lines and we get to laugh at the same thing at the same time.⁴

³ Yes, I caught my love of footnotes from Terry Pratchett. Yes, even nested footnotes.

⁴ Previously, with our pair of paperbacks, one of us would laugh and then have to explain which part we were reading to the other.