Lesson: Should You Skip Christmas?/ExerciseL1

Listening Exercise

<quiz display=simple> {Watch the video and complete the text according to what you can understand. |type="{}"} Here comes Santa Claus! It's that time of the year again and… There is absolutely no way to escape the fact that the winter {holidays_9} are happening in America. That's right: you can't {ignore_7} it, even if you wanted to… Short of hopping on a plane and going to an island where they never {heard_6} of American culture. And that's why I was having this conversation with Dr. Marie Hartwell Walker. I'm psychologist and family {therapist_10} and I've been in practice for almost 35 years. And she's {written_8} on the importance of the holidays for families. Although, she is the first to admit that the {winter_7} holidays can be really toxic for a lot of people. If I go home for Christmas, will dad get drunk again? Will mom be, hmm, at me again about my {weight_7} or my grades or my, hmm, lack of having whatever, enough children, too many dogs, I don’t know. So, since I was talking with a professional I {thought_8} I would ask: “Is it dangerous to just, I don’t know, {skip_5} the holidays … take a break?” I don’t think it's {dangerous_10} to skip the holidays, but I think it is a missed {opportunity_12}. Our lives can be so unstable. Life {changes_8} day after day after day and traditions provide some predictability in an {otherwise_10} unpredictable world. So, just think of yourself as a {small_6} child and how many new things might happen within the course of a day. And some of those {experiences_12} may be confusing or bewildering or even frightening. And some of those new experiences are wonderful but can also be overwhelming. So, the nighttime ritual usually is something like {dinner_7}, bath, hmm, story time, drink. And the stories are two or three favorites right? Yeah It gives them {something_10} solid that they can hold onto in an otherwise very unpredictable world. And, that's {important_10} stuff! It's {helping_8} the child pull together all of that {random_7} new stuff and make some sense of it. So if we're {talking_8} about Christmas, we're really talking about one huge {tradition_10}. We do the tree, we get {presents_9}, we sing these carols, we go to this event. And these traditions give us some predictability that help us pause and make sense of our {lives_6}. You go home, mom makes the same {cookies_8} she has always made. You have the same turkey or roast beef you always had. Right, but what if you don’t have good {childhood_10} memories? Those winter holidays can be an opportunity to set something new in {motion_7}, and I really encourage the people who are distressed about the holidays to think about what they would like to have happen. What piece of that wish that you always had as a kid: Can you, in fact, uh, do now that you're the {grown_6} up? Because we can.