A snowy Christmas
Pembridge Square, Notting Hill.
Silence falls, just before. A snow silence you can feel, and hear it’s silence as it calls you to the window. The world is white outside, in the night. Christmas white, Christmas delight.
‘Hello sweet love.’ I say. I do not move. God’s confetti is the gentlest kind. Falling snow is kind. We all need kindness at this time of year, and I know tomorrow we will all complain about the weather, the ice, but tonight is a gentle gift.
Ten days to go before Christmas. A month, or maybe more of decorations and jingles in the shops. God, I needed these pretty, twirly distractions to soften the year. The crowds have descended on Fortnum’s Tea boxes, foraging jams and pate’s in swooping hands. Bond Street bustles for images of Lauren, Cartier, Dior and Vuitton - instagram mania, swooning and bumping, but I love it really, we are all hungry for prettiness. Stepping over the homeless man sleeping under a mottled, blue duvet in a sheltered doorway.
Cartier.
Does the cold drive them there, or do I just become more aware when frilliness and frailty meet on Berkeley Square?
The Christmas tours through Covent Garden, steeped in traditions and mulled wine, are reminders of Charles Dickens in all we celebrate today. Victorian Christmas in 2022. Remember my first real Mistletoe, white berry branches tied to a post at a Christmas stall in Cambridge. Tied with a bit of gardener’s string. Years past, the memory deeply buried in my heart.
Mistletoe dates back to the festival of Saturnalia, to honour Saturn, the Roman god of fertility and agriculture. Mistletoe, Holly and Ivy are evergreen, unusual in winter and thus symbols of good fortune. Kissing under the mistletoe is believed to have originated amongst the working classes in Victorian times.
The boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse.
I was privileged enough to see a preview of this breathtaking animated film. Who would have thought that the simplest of kind messages, of friendship and feeling lost would resonate so deeply with an adult audience. The truth is, the older we get, it is the simplest of gestures we crave - to belong, to feel loved, to be treated kindly. Wait a minute, that is what we all crave, whatever our age.
I have walked London from river edge to river edge, peering at window displays - the most refined to a single thread of tinsel. Bus drivers wear Santa hats. Christmas drinks all cream and marshmallows. Christmas jumpers.
Bought presents at charity shops, bought ‘The Issue’ - and gifted myself the pleasure to indulge in children’s books, eat a mince pie too many, and be ok with being on my own, most of the time - to walk streets filled with families and friends, content with the idea of just me taking in the lights, the sights, the splendour of crunching snow. I’ve rather come to like the idle time of bookshops, of being just me with me.
Step outside, phew, that’s cold. Beanie, scarf, gloves and enough layers to bounce off a Boeing - bring me bright sunshine or silver frost, this is a snowy Christmas and I am exactly where I should be - in the glow.
I leave you with a story that is my Christmas message this year xxx
Image: BBC.