bewilderbrain

The snow actually has been falling…the lights are sparkling and the cheese is so very far from finished…

To anyone else sitting amongst the Blackpool illuminations while every neighbour’s windowsill now displays a single well- polished bonsai tree:

I see you….and I salute you.

You see, it’s Christmas time. There are twelve days of Christmas, and the final night of celebration (in most cultures, for some it’s later) is the 5^th of January.

Now, before all you clean window-sillers get cross, I get it. I really do.

There is something about the new year, that first of a new month feeling, the post- apocalyptic stilton-fugged chaos of Christmas, that screams for a clean, stark reboot. I can respect this.

But I’m nevertheless totally advocating for hanging in there.

Besides the fact that this is, in fact, the proper end of the Christmas period, and I don’t want to miss the twelve drummers drumming, there are a couple of other very strong reasons.

Round our way, the good people of the Welsh Valleys often go big on Christmas. Many of the thick- walled Victorian terraced windowsills display not so much festive lights and decorations as full snow laden North-pole or nativity scenes, or reindeer meticulously hand-knitted from stardust and candy-canes.

And those lucky enough to be the possessor of a front garden, well, there are no limits to the imagination here. Full size Santas, elves, reindeer, sleighs, lamp-posts, with every variation of lighting you could wish for, sometimes even complete with sound effects and projectors. I have yet to see a live donkey in one, but frankly, it wouldn’t surprise me.

Not only is their celebration of Christmas abundant -in many cases – it begins mind-bogglingly early. I know of more than one house which commences Christmas decorating protocol as soon as the giant Halloween ghouls and pumpkins are returned to their boxes.

For me, this is way too early. And I have the bulletproof reason that I love Christmas so much that I refuse to be sick of it by mid -December.

But maybe it is this shortly post-summer start to the festivities that causes the sad demise of Christmas around new year.

I always feel a bit sad, even annoyed with people, when only our house and one other on the street are hanging in there through those first days of January.

Last night, in the bitter cold and glittering frost, we bundled up and went for a family walk around the streets in the dark. Above us, shone the magical light of January’s full moon, the Wolf Moon.

On each street we walked, there were one or two other windows, still lit up, trees proudly on display, Christmas bolding continuing.

I was surprised by how much joy this brought me. And I decided that next year I will patrol the streets at the same time but with a set of bells, which I can jingle in celebration and solidarity with the other January Christmassers.

So, my two reasons for hanging in till twelfth night.

Cheese, and Chaos reward.

Cheese.

The more practical of my two reasons.

There is sooo much cheese.

I can’t have this many varieties of cheese left over with no Christmas or spirit with which to accompany them. Should I still be downing Boursin topped dates? No, no of course I shouldn’t. But this really isn’t the moment to take back full control.

Cheese might be a particular weakness in this household (at one point over Christmas I discovered making sandwiches with two different types of cheese as the outside of the sandwich and a sliced gherkin as the filling)

And no, no I don’t feel apologetic about that at all.

But it’s not just cheese. And your particular cheese might be crackers or crisps, or cake. But I’m sure I am not alone in buying FAR more Christmas food than we need or can afford (resulting in a lot of cheese and lentil- based stews and a January even more windy than Christmas)

When shopping for Christmas, my brain reaches a previously unseen type of buying overdrive…. I go into full panic mode about having every possible type of Christmas related edible substance in the house.

I have a woefully inadequate sense of appropriate quantity at the best of times, which, combined with my acute gullibility to the merciless advertising of Christmas products, and an overstimulated ADHD brain, leaves me a quivering wreck in the supermarket, where the possibility of having omitted to purchase mint flavoured matchmakers suddenly takes on the capacity to bring Santa himself to a standstill.

Indeed, the conquest of the Christmas supermarket requires such Herculean effort that the mere idea of having to attend the place again at any point over the festive period brings me out in a cold cheese sweat.

So, there is too much food. Too much cheese.

Keep Christmas going till the last second, and enjoy your brandy and brie laced cornflakes with impunity.

Reason 2 is the more important one. The more spiritual, if you will, and non-cheese related reason for allowing Christmas to spill naturally and joyfully into January.

Chaos reward

You made it through the height of the festive period, Christmas, New Year, the visits, the arrangements, the stress, the wrapping, the hiding, the magic making, the late nights, the cheese induced stomach cramps…you made it through….in the style of someone pasting on a festive grin and a Santa hat whilst clinging desperately to a set of water-skis attached to a transit van on the M4.

Sometimes, Christmas is so full on, so speedily, loudly, busily, fully Christmas, that its hard to stop for long enough or peer through the exhaustion with enough clarity to feel, you know, Christmassy.

In our household, we have a family birthday in the very late end of the “Twixmas” period, and whilst wonderful, this adds further to the excitement, the chaos, the overwhelm.

In January, something magical happens.

A different seasonal quiet and stillness descends. Responsibilities diminish slightly, the roaring pace of festivity slows.  In this tiny but critical juncture between the 1^st and the 6^th of January, there is a mingling of the fresh white feel of stark, stripped bare newness that January brings, with the soft sparkle of a quieter Christmas room, the still green smell and colours of the tree, a festivity that is not residual, but rather matured and seasoned, now calmer and more settled in its aura.

This is the more introverted, nurturing end of Christmas, the end you deserve, if December was a festive whirlwind.

The compulsion to be outside is now strong, to breathe in the air of the new year, this fresh and frosty January we are enjoying, the sound of the birds, the smells of nature, the bare winter landscape with low sun sparkling on icy branches.

And contained within it, sleeping but present, the promise of spring, resting quietly furled and warm in the earth, but stepping incrementally closer with each lengthening of the dark day.

And at this time of year, after being outside, the compulsion to return home is also strong. And for a few days at least, to return to the now quieter magic of Christmastime. Of lights that brighten the darker evenings, of warmth and nesting, of the permission granted by both the season and the time of year to rest, to pleasantly idle, to repose in comfort and stillness and let the new year soak in gradually.

For all the abundance of new furniture desires, fitness regimes, eating plans, and total life overhauls that January tends to bring on, the nature around us, the season outside, urges us to slow down, to be patient -to be kind.

Now is a time to soften, to tread lightly, but hopefully, to rest, to reflect, to nurture ideas for the new year kindly and flexibly, to allow our brains and bodies essential time to restore in order that we can fully bloom when the longer days come.

And whether you are with me, still sitting amidst fairy-lit stilton, or you are enjoying a crisp and simple room in all its glory, hold this magical transient moment of the year close. Raise a sherry, raise a cocoa, raise a herbal cuppa or a fruit smoothie, in truth – there is no wrong twelfth night celebration. However we choose to spend our January 5th, the biggest gift we can give ourselves is to go gently into the new year.