Illustration by Wenting Li
As an adult, I’ve started to think of holiday light displays as a collective “hang in there!” from our neighbours when our northern latitude is at its darkest. This year that’s perhaps true more than ever. Plugging lights in at night is a cheery and helpful way to orient passersby as they trudge to and from work in the dark. Or take the dog around the block before returning to a home office, as the case may be. It’s a festive habit to ensure we don’t all accidentally become nocturnal.
Life may look and feel the same 17 hours a day, but see these lovely lights? It is, in fact, evening now. Cheers to you for muddling through another day. Things are looking quite bleak, that’s true, but we’ll just keep busying ourselves switching the lights on and off, and then before you know it will be spring again. In the meantime, enjoy this comforting shimmer in the midst of a harsh season.
Well not any more! Thanks to the widespread adoption of those hellish blue LED lights, a nice walk around the block now hits like a cold slap in the face.
As soon as the cold weather arrives and people start hanging their holiday decorations in earnest, it’s not long before I start complaining about the eerie blue shine that has replaced the multicoloured glow of my childhood. Haunted by the ghost of Christmas-lights past, I refuse to accept that those bright blue LED lights are an adequate substitute.
As a kid, putting up our Christmas lights was a momentous occasion, one that always started with my dad and I eyeing up a jumbled pile of cords tipped from a box onto the front porch. He’d untangle and I’d supervise, hands on hips with the confidence of a self-appointed party foreman. Once the wires were straight, we’d go through and tighten every bulb looking for the weak link that threatened to sabotage the whole line.
When it was confirmed that we had a live wire, my dad would clamber up the ladder and start twist-tying the cord to old nails that had been tapped into the house many holidays ago. I would stand below holding the string of lights between two hands, slack, like a dead rabbit. Waiting to hand them up, I’d chip the paint off the coloured bulbs and wonder what it would be like to eat glass (like the Grinch did in his movie, not because I was a disturbed 10 year old).
After every string of lights was up, the whole family would huddle outside in the cold waiting for the grand reveal. On the count of three, my dad would plug them in and we’d all “oooh” and “aaah” as the house transformed from dark and dreary into a festive wonderland.
We’d revel in our handiwork (never mind that it looked the same every year) for as long as we could stand the cold, then scurry back inside to carry on with our cozy evening – the holiday season officially upon us.
These days, it’s not all LED lights I take issue with (though many have that unnerving stutter). They are far more energy-efficient, which is important, and some are a nice-enough hue. It’s specifically those horrible blue ones I can’t stand.
At the risk of sounding crotchety beyond my years, I cannot begin to fathom what kind of masochist would choose to cast their surroundings in such a spooky, searing light. They are an affront to everything charming and gentle about the season – more spaceship than sparkle. Every time I see them, I squint as the quivering light slices through my eyes and bounces off the back of my skull; so achingly dull they become piercing.
Plus, I thought we had all decided against blue being a good Christmas colour when Elvis sang it so in 1957.
Dare to invite your family outside to watch you turn them on for the first time and your kids won’t see straight for a week. Instead of basking in the warm glow of your accomplishment, congratulations, your house just gave everyone laser eye surgery.
Venture inside one of the blue Christmas houses and – I imagine – you’ll find them listening to a high-pitched ringing noise on repeat, sitting next to a tree that’s so bright you could perform surgery under it.
I’m not the only one to complain about this either. Last year, the French Health Agency reviewed the effects of harsh LED lighting and warned, “exposure to an intense and powerful light is photo-toxic and can lead to irreversible loss of retinal cells and diminished sharpness of vision.” It wasn’t a Christmas-light specific analysis (go figure), but I wonder if there may be some overlap in their findings.
Everyone’s brain is different and mine gets migraines from time to time, so that’s probably the true source of my disdain for the blue holiday lights. Maybe other people’s brains find them delightful. Even so, noting the gruelling year we’ve had – and the home-bound holidays we’re stuck with – perhaps we could collectively strive for more outdoor cheer this year. Less glaring and futuristic, more comforting and nostalgic.
Claire Hume lives in Victoria.
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