“Nobody’s walking out on this fun, old-fashioned family Christmas. No, no. We’re all in this together. This is a full-blown, four-alarm holiday emergency here. We’re gonna press on, and we’re gonna have the hap, hap, happiest Christmas since Bing Crosby tap-danced with Danny … Kaye.”

Does the 1989 movie, “National Lampoons Christmas Vacation” cut a little-too close to home? You love the holidays. And the decorations are beautiful, once they’re up. Well, they’re bright and colorful, anyhow, even if your husband, who, around the beginning of December, seems as though he’s possessed by the Ghost of Griswold past, tends to put up too many lights in random and disassociated … can you call them ‘patterns?’

Putting up the holiday decorations is an annual ritual, though more an act of insanity, isn’t it? How long will it take to untangle that massive ball of last-year’s lights? And how many times will your husband cuss before the strings are untangled? Once the Christmas lights are untangled, how many of those strings will work? How many strings of lights will work just long enough for your husband to dangle precariously from the ladder and install them before they go out like the punch line to Christmas comedy?

Of course, you don’t watch him putting up the lights. The experience, watching and waiting for him to fall, always leaves you breathless with terror. Besides, there’s the deterioration of his language. Well, who needs to hear that and, hopefully, the neighbors won’t. It’s better just to stay inside and hope for the best until he’s done, though you do keep an ear pealed for any loud thuds that might indicate a need to call an ambulance.

Then there’s the tree. Putting up, and decorating, the tree would probably be more fun if it didn’t somehow always occur as an extension of the frustration caused by putting the decorations up outside. If you could just relax enjoy it as a family activity. Instead, you almost expect a squirrel to jump out of the tree even though it’s an artificial tree you keep up in the attic the rest of the year.

Take a deep breath. Make some hot chocolate, have a seat and think about it. Isn’t it true that the Jones’s across the street have lights beautifully strung on their home each Christmas? Their Christmas lights are installed with purpose. The Christmas lights even seem to favorably accent their home. And have you ever seen Mr. Jones out on a ladder installing their Christmas lights? It’s as though a little Christmas magic carefully strings the lights along the gutters, eves and windows.

Come to think of it, haven’t you seen a work van in their driveway every year around Christmas time? Men with ladders get out of the van and go to work. But you’ve never really paid attention to what they’re doing. Could it be their putting up the Christmas lights?

Just think of the possibilities; professionals will come to your home, people who know how to work safely from ladders, who use good, quality, ‘working’ Christmas lights, and who know how to install the lights with the care and detail of professionals. The only Clark W Griswold you’ll see in your house is the one of the TV screen when you pop the DVD in while casually decorating the Christmas tree.