“Wash the windows for Jesus in Polish houses is a real festival of stupidity. My mother-in-law is already rubbing her hands”

Christmas is fast approaching. In Polish homes it is always a special time, full of magic, joy and spending time together with your loved ones. However, to fully enjoy the charm of the long-awaited holidays, you still need to prepare them. In addition to cooking, many people do thorough cleaning, which has become a long-standing pre-Christmas tradition.

“My mother-in-law runs around with a rag and wants to clean every corner. As if that wasn’t enough, she keeps inventing things for me to do”

I am a happily married woman and mother of two children. Our biggest dream is to build a house and we have slowly started implementing our plan. And since all this costs a lot, it will be a long time before we move into our own place. For this reason, we decided to move in with our in-laws so that we could put the rent money into our own account and not into someone else’s pocket. My parents-in-law live in a large house and help us a lot, so we saw only advantages in it. The first disadvantages appeared only now, when Christmas is approaching. My mother-in-law runs around with a rag and wants to clean every corner. As if that wasn’t enough, he constantly invents activities for me to do so that I don’t feel left out in all the Christmas festivities.

“I don’t want my children to remember childhood holidays through the prism of cleaning”

I believe that all these Catholic actions entitled “Wash the windows for Jesus” in Polish homes is a real festival of stupidity. My mother-in-law is already rubbing her hands because she can’t imagine anyone noticing the dust. For me this is terribly strange, because I come from a home where preparations for Christmas looked completely different. Instead of cleaning, we made dumplings or decorated gingerbread together. When spikes flew from the Christmas tree, we knew that at least it was a real tree and not some fake. My mother-in-law would love to fly around the apartment on a brush.

I don’t want my children to remember childhood holidays through the prism of cleaning. I can’t imagine it, so I can’t wait until we live in our own house and she can spend the holidays on her own terms. And during these upcoming holidays, I wish each and every one of you to feel special and not have to wash windows, but only spend priceless moments with your loved ones.

Ilona.

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