Being in a city where the sun hardly ever sleeps makes Christmas a physical and mental challenge. No icy streets to avoid slipping on, no blanket of sodden, fallen leaves to trudge through and none of the relentless street corner carolling from chuggers and latchkey kids on the make. Just the sunshine, clear blue skies and refined, acoustic covers of Christmas hits in local gift shops.
Many of the traditions in the run up to Christmas are missing. This includes the yearly favourite, inspired by betting company PR departments, around the growing chances of a white Christmas. For a few weeks weather forecasters play along with reasonable degrees of humour before offering us reassurance that no snowflakes will fall on the big day.
There’s good news for betting people in that the old test used to be a snowflake falling on the Met Office building in London. But the developing sophistication of the bookies means that some of them offer different odds for different parts of the country. Paddy Power makes Aberdeen this year’s favourite – which may be the first time since Alex Ferguson’s tenure that they have been favourites for anything.
There doesn’t seem to be an equivalent in the US. Some parts of the country seem to be fatalistically awaiting or have had several weeks thigh-deep snowdrifts, while others are blithely deciding which pair of shorts to wear. It’s another reminder that the UK could fit, in terms of land mass, into each of the ten largest states in the US.
The other sign of changing times is the diminishing need to leave the house to shop. On too many occasion my Christmas Eve was spent dashing around an overheated department store buying overly expensive gifts. The cost was usually proportionate to my desperation and sense of guilt about lack of planning.
The efficiency of online retailing has made the last minute dash a thing of the past. I cannot be alone in my astonishment that orders seem to arrive almost before they are made. Perhaps the next step is that Alexa simply chooses for you what gifts are to be purchased without you even having to think about it.
My problem with that would be that Alexa has a habit of misunderstanding me. I think it’s an accent thing and I have lost many games of Jeopardy or Pop Quiz due to answers being rejected because I have not develop a trans-Atlantic twang. The specific failing is that years of reminding the children ‘there’s a ‘t’ in that word’ means I don’t geddit that I should say paddio rather than patio.
Music has also become a bone of contention with the sunshine creating a slightly perverse demand amongst locals for full on Christmas cheer. My post-ironical play-list containing the more profound but less joyful classics, ‘Christmas in February’ and ‘Christmas Card from a Hooker in Minneapolis’, has been roundly rejected. There is a real tension between attitudes in a sunny, warm climate and those bred in the harsh reality of an English winter.
My belief in gritty realism is that I’ve always taken the view that the celebration is grounded in very difficult circumstances. It’s about an impoverished family, bullied by a venal government, taking temporary shelter in conditions suitable only for cattle. It seems well established that social services failed them terribly and that cutbacks to the emergency services meant they couldn’t get there in time for the birth.
In a classic Government cover up the Government of the day decided to move the news cycle on by launching a campaign to persecute infant boys. Twitter resistance was launched under #notustoo but nobody was ever successfully prosecuted. Over time all of the events were glossed over or denied and secret payments were made to ensure the silence of those involved.
Editor’s Note: None of the above should be taken to reflect any events or people past or present. It’s inconceivable that any of these things could happen in a well-ordered democracy where the rule of law prevails.
Looking back I was reminded that in the early 1990s I spent all night in the run-up to one Christmas in the ASDA Clapham store. We had managed to take advantage of the changes in UK legislation to become the first major store to be open for 24-hours. It seems so common nowadays that it feels like a different world to remember that all big stores used to shut by 10pm.
Christmas in the aisles was punctuated by the PR specials we had imported to enliven proceedings. The man on the bed of nails certainly made an incongruous addition to the non-food aisles as was the sight of the company’s CEO carrying out bag-packing duties at 3am in the morning. The next day’s coverage was spectacular and the face of late-night shopping in the UK was changed forever.
This will also my second year without a traditional works Christmas party. High kicking to ‘New York New York’ has happened, inappropriate behaviour that has brewed all year between colleagues has occurred, and the trousers of a board director have fallen down. A lot of alcohol has been taken and hangover breakfasts consumed.
The partner of a work-mate has phoned at 4am to say the boyfriend isn’t home and that Find Friends is locating his phone in the middle of Albert Dock. People have cried, shouted, argued and cried some more. There has been a lot of laughter and high jinks that have made Christmas Day feel like the last mile in a marathon of celebration.
No such dramas this year. The tree is up and decorated, the dogs have their Christmas sweaters and there will be beef and Yorkshire puddings as we pull the crackers for lunch on the 25th. And I will have the best excuse to continue my personal tradition of never watching the Queen’s (God Bless Her) speech.
Thanks to all those who have read any of my musings during 2018. I hope you have a wonderful Christmas and a joyous New Year. All the best for 2019.
Reading this brought back a memory of mum – she said that the only time she felt homesick was receiving a snow scene Christmas card when stationed in Kenya.
I can imagine that. It’s the small things that catch you out. Seeing Christmas lights amidst the palm trees is a bit strange as well:-)