Collecting things has always kind of been...my thing. When I was a little kid, I absolutely had to have every new GI Joe that came out. I had so many GI Joes that we had to build shelves in my room for them. When I was a teenager, I started collecting comic books. Comics were an obsession that lasts even to this very day, but when I got into college I began with a whole new collection...of Christmas clothes. I wanted to be different, and wearing nothing but Christmas shirts sure struck me as being different.
I'm not really as nuts as I may seem, you know. There was a very clear reason why I bought seven shirts the first time I ever made an online order for these Holiday t-shirts. Seven shirts for the seven days of the week. I was determined to wear nothing but the cutesiest, silliest, loveable Christmas-themed shirts I could find. The nefarious reason I wanted to wear these ridiculous things is because in a college town where everyone looks and dresses the same...I would stand WAY out. It was a way to make a statement that fashion doesn't matter and that a good personality is what really matters.
All of my weirdness paid off for me, though. One night I ended up in a long conversation with this extremely good looking girl who made my heart slam against my ribcage. I'm not talking about the kind of attraction that leads to a bedroom for a night and then a lifetime of awkward glances at the bar. I'm talking about love. This girl was smart, provocative, and sly. She was a challenge, and I loved that we spent the whole night fencing with our words. My stupid Christmas shirts never even came up in the conversation.
Things seemed to progress really quickly at this point. We spent more and more time together, became a charming couple that everyone liked, and then eventually moved into an apartment together. I had planned on staying single until I was out of college, but that plan didn't even matter any longer. All that mattered were my classes and my girlfriend. I knew I was hopelessly in love with her when I noticed her looking through my laundry and shaking her head disapprovingly and immediately hated all of those shirts. I didn't even have to ask her what was bothering her.
She was totally right, of course. The silly hobby had gone on so long I had lost sight of why I was even doing it in the first place. I had almost a hundred of these shirts and they were all extremely inappropriate for anything other than looking stupid at the bar. With only a touch of sadness in my heart, I donated all of the Christmas tees I owned to a local homeless shelter and left that part of my life behind me forever. People were actually shocked when I started showing up to social events in regular clothes, but the quips died away after a very brief time.
After a few months, I had almost forgot about being the "Christmas guy". A couple of more months passed, and the actual Holiday in question was here. The one day a year when it would have been okay to wear those Christmas t-shirts and I didn't have any to put on. We decided to visit that same mission where my shirts were donated in order to help feed the homeless on Christmas Eve. That would never had occurred to me, but my girlfriend is a gentle soul and helping people was second nature to her. When we walked through the door, however, the whole world slowed down. There were so many people wearing the Christmas clothes I had given up that I was dumbfounded by the festive nature of it all. I felt a tear on my cheek and my girl gave my hand a squeeze. I finally knew what this whole Christmas thing should have been about all along.
I'm not really as nuts as I may seem, you know. There was a very clear reason why I bought seven shirts the first time I ever made an online order for these Holiday t-shirts. Seven shirts for the seven days of the week. I was determined to wear nothing but the cutesiest, silliest, loveable Christmas-themed shirts I could find. The nefarious reason I wanted to wear these ridiculous things is because in a college town where everyone looks and dresses the same...I would stand WAY out. It was a way to make a statement that fashion doesn't matter and that a good personality is what really matters.
All of my weirdness paid off for me, though. One night I ended up in a long conversation with this extremely good looking girl who made my heart slam against my ribcage. I'm not talking about the kind of attraction that leads to a bedroom for a night and then a lifetime of awkward glances at the bar. I'm talking about love. This girl was smart, provocative, and sly. She was a challenge, and I loved that we spent the whole night fencing with our words. My stupid Christmas shirts never even came up in the conversation.
Things seemed to progress really quickly at this point. We spent more and more time together, became a charming couple that everyone liked, and then eventually moved into an apartment together. I had planned on staying single until I was out of college, but that plan didn't even matter any longer. All that mattered were my classes and my girlfriend. I knew I was hopelessly in love with her when I noticed her looking through my laundry and shaking her head disapprovingly and immediately hated all of those shirts. I didn't even have to ask her what was bothering her.
She was totally right, of course. The silly hobby had gone on so long I had lost sight of why I was even doing it in the first place. I had almost a hundred of these shirts and they were all extremely inappropriate for anything other than looking stupid at the bar. With only a touch of sadness in my heart, I donated all of the Christmas tees I owned to a local homeless shelter and left that part of my life behind me forever. People were actually shocked when I started showing up to social events in regular clothes, but the quips died away after a very brief time.
After a few months, I had almost forgot about being the "Christmas guy". A couple of more months passed, and the actual Holiday in question was here. The one day a year when it would have been okay to wear those Christmas t-shirts and I didn't have any to put on. We decided to visit that same mission where my shirts were donated in order to help feed the homeless on Christmas Eve. That would never had occurred to me, but my girlfriend is a gentle soul and helping people was second nature to her. When we walked through the door, however, the whole world slowed down. There were so many people wearing the Christmas clothes I had given up that I was dumbfounded by the festive nature of it all. I felt a tear on my cheek and my girl gave my hand a squeeze. I finally knew what this whole Christmas thing should have been about all along.
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For more information about a classy Christmas apparel check out Matt's pick for the best Christmas family clothing on the web.