The turkey has been carved, the pies have been devoured, and we have now entered the start of the holiday season. While December in your 20s is not as fun and completely carefree as it used to be when you still believed in Santa, it’s not all bad. Here are 18 ways that you know you’re a 20-something during the holidays.
1. You want to decorate for the holidays but you have no idea where you would store the tree, wreaths, and lights in your small apartment when the season is over.
2. You officially ring in the holidays by dressing up and getting drunk at your local SantaCon.
3. You hurry to request your days off before the rest of the office or else get stuck working on days like Christmas Eve or New Years Eve because you forgot.
4. You begin receiving holiday cards from your married friends and/or friends with their lives together.
5. You try to recapture your youth by watching all your favorite childhood Christmas movies like Rudolph and Frosty the Snowman. You also find yourself understanding the Heat Miser a little better.
6. You embrace all that is peppermint mocha.
7. You struggle to find a Secret Santa gift that’s cheap but doesn’t seem cheap. Somehow alcohol seems to fit the bill for the majority of the people on your list in your twenties.
8. You fill your calendar with obligations like holiday mixers, family events, and gift exchanges when you would rather be at home doing nothing and being antisocial.
9. You continue to attend ugly sweater parties but the novelty is beginning to wear off. At this point, everyone has seen your token ugly sweater.
10. You navigate through your social media and are inundated with holiday marriage proposals.
11. You send your parents a Christmas list that increasingly includes responsible things like a crock-pot or a Kitchen Aid mixer. Or you don’t even know what to put on your Christmas list because you can buy yourself whatever you want.
12. You wonder, what is the point of eggnog if it’s not spiked?
13. You reunite with hometown friends that you don’t get to see nearly enough at local haunts that you are glad you don’t visit very often.
14. You spend the month of December eating and drinking in excess and do not have the motivation to make yourself workout regularly. More sweaters and leggings please.
15. You attend the required company holiday party. This will include enduring the perfunctory small talk with your boss and suffering secondhand embarrassment from watching at least one coworker overdo it at the open bar.
16. You inevitably shove through crowds and participate in last-minute shopping. On Black Friday, Christmas seems so far away but thankfully there are still excellent sales for procrastinators in the days leading up to it.
17. You travel home to your parent’s house from your new city and die a little bit at the cost. Even booking your flight in advance will get pricey but it’s without-a-doubt worth the expense.
18. You begin making New Years plans. Do we have to start stressing about 2016 already?!
