Well hello there, December. Is that snow I can see in your pocket? Come in and rest your hoary head.
How soon the seasons come around. One minute I notice the first leaves start to turn brown, the next the decorations are going up and people are rushing around in their customary blind panic.
Unpacked and dusted down is the above antique. A seasonal decoration that is now thirty seven years old. A masterpiece of royal blue and gold.
The things you can do with toilet roll and tinsel.
This is the last link to my very first school, Mossfield Primary. I made this aged five, in my very first year at school. A year later I left due to my family moving home.The cracker came with me.
Every Christmas this inimitable creation took pride of place on many a tree that has long since been discarded. I think once I got older and left the family nest my folks were pleased to see this work of art go with me. And then my less than impressed wife, every single year, tries to relegate it to the back of our tree where nobody can see it, or, even more brazenly, attempts to leave it in the cardboard box altogether. Ostensibly to help preserve this ancient artifact, but she has been heard to mutter, God forgive her, that it is ‘just a thirty seven year old bog roll.’
Uncouth, common, love of my life that she is.
It is a symbol, dear wife, a symbol.
So the cracker is on the tree, the fixed points on my timeline are all joined up. Our season of celebration has now started and Christmas Day will be here before we know it.
Try to take some time out if you can, to enjoy the season, and attain a bit of perspective, before you get swallowed up by a mass of competitive humanity rolling in the aisles over that last bag of sprouts.
Have a great time.
In fact, have a cracker.
City Jackdaw 