Snow is falling, music is playing, the presents are all wrapped, the kids are happy… if this was almost any other singer, you’d think to yourself what a sweet scene this song is painting. But the singer here is Tammy Wynette, of “Stand By Your Man” and “D.I.V.O.R.C.E.” fame, and in her songs, you don’t find love without also finding more turbulent feelings close by.
Which is why, even though this song seems perfectly warm on its face, I keep hearing a subtext. There’s a line in the first verse where Wynette sings “it’s the season for me to be happy,” and I’m immediately thinking, does she not get to be happy the rest of the year? Or look at the title: she doesn’t say they’re having a merry Christmas, she concludes, based on the evidence, that this is what a merry Christmas looks like so, therefore, they must be having one. Does their Christmas actually feel merry? She never quite says.
I enjoy all of Tammy Wynette’s solo holiday songs as well as her duets with George Jones. They may not cheer you up much, but you’ll feel better having heard them.
