Diandra Grandison, Staff Reporter

With just 15 days to go until Christmas, the excitement that I should be experiencing during the 'most wonderful time of the year' is sadly non-existent, and died years ago due to the increasingly high cost of living.

Growing up, I looked forward to the hassle of unravelling bundles of knotted pepper lights recklessly tossed aside in a tangled mess after the previous year's showcase. The lights, laden with months of accumulated dust, triggered a sneezing frenzy along with my sinuses and hours spent trying to position them just right for a spectacular light show.

But that tradition hasn't been done in years because if I barely turn my lights on during the other 11 months and my bill is sky high, I don't even want to know what it would look like in January with the pepper lights added.

Christmas was the time of year to feast on food that I would not normally eat throughout the year like fruit cake, sorrel, and ham, whether it was chicken or pork. I'd wait until Christmas to have these items.

But the joy I had of being busy in the kitchen baking multiple batches of fruit cakes, making sorrel and roasting ham has been drastically reduced, if not non-existent because of the rising cost of food. If a tin of corned beef is almost $300, ham is clearly out of my league. These items are almost like caviar, in that they are luxury items.

Another Christmas favourite of mine was the exchanging of gifts. I looked forward to seeing the look of joy and appreciation on the faces of my loved ones.

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But now, giving gifts been has reduced to a broadcast via WhatsApp or bbm or a nice virtual card posted on loved ones' Facebook page to acknowledge that they are in my thoughts during the season.

I am sure that I am not the only person experiencing this melancholy, this very commercialised and arguably meaningless season. I can bet if I do a survey, most Jamaicans will agree with me. And, as some of us break the bank to buy these costly items, I have resigned myself to not celebrating Christmas because my pockets won't allow me to.