Did you have a good Christmas?

Did you have a good Christmas?

"But they all sound like jobs.  I don't really want to do any jobs."

Preparing for Christmas Day can be a solitary occupation.


We had booked a skiing trip for ten days of the school holidays and wouldn't be at home on 25th December.

"Really? Great!" The response from our keenest skiier.

"I don't want to go away for Christmas." The youngest child was concerned that the magic of yuletide would be lost somewhere on a red run.

In light of the planned holiday, my other half had issued an edict: "No fuss this year.  Shopping won't take up too much time that way."  I still  spent hours traipsing round the retail outlets of West Country towns and cities in a bid to buy suitable presents for a minimal festive season.

We combined enthusiasm with encouragement and made plans.  Drive to France, eight full days' skiing, and back home.  A twenty-four hour hiatus, and then we would hold Christmas Day on New Year's Day.  We would close the curtains, ignore the 'phone and the internet, open stockings and go the whole hog, or turkey.


"My salopettes are too small."

"Mum, I don't have any skiing gloves. Remember?" No.

Where had the one hundred and one pairs of ski socks gone?  Purloined by members of the extended family, all eager to borrow, none prepared to drive the pilfered posssessions back to their original owners.  With roads like ice rinks, we could hardly blame them.  "Remind me never to lend anything to ... again," I hissed and added socks to my no-fuss list.

For reasons of fuel economy a roof-box was decided against.  We have a large car, and a large family.  No longer sub-ten tots, the teens rebelled against being holed up in a confined space; bags of clothing, towels, essential food supplies, snow-chains, a box of crackers and an insisted-upon two-foot-high fake tree, piled about them.  The six-foot son is more comfortable sitting in the front, as are his parents, but three people into two seats don't go.

The worst driving conditions for some years meant an earlier departure than planned, in order to make it to our scheduled tunnel crossing.  We excelled ourselves (the weather held back for a few hours) and arrived early.  Previous trains had been cancelled and there were none running for at least an hour.  At four-thirty in the morning, I played Hangman in the back of a cramped people-carrier with our ten year old; her last burst of energy for the entire holiday.

Northern France was kind to us.  No snow storms or ice, just driving rain and fog, but my temperature of the past forty-eight hours peaked whenever the paracetamol wore thin.  As we approached the bottom or the mountain the dashboard beeped and lit up.  This was not an attempt on the car's behalf to bring Christmas cheer. 'Brake disc pads,' it flashed importantly.  Days of driving cautiously on snow and ice in the Alps doesn't do much for one's nerves.

Rarely have there been such perfect skiing conditions.

All too often 'flu' times its appearance to perfection.  Just two members of the family, so I can't complain.  My only feeling of well-being came from knowing that I was in a better state than our younger daughter, whose temperature rose ever higher and whose consumption of Calpol and all other medicines was commendable.  She and I didn't leave the apartment for three days and spent much time huddled under duvets, twin beds pushed together for comfort, and tissues littering the floor.  Try reading Holes, wonderful book though it is, out loud with a sore throat.  I made her read War Horse to herself when she was well enough to do so.

Two days after we arrived in France, we had a 'phone call.  A burst pipe had brought itself to the attention of our neighbour, who had been on her way to shut up the chickens.  The pipe concerned was in a garage; but in one filled with my brother-in-law's furniture.  In our household, all drainage, maintenance and 'facilities' comes under M for Mum.  This time, D for Dad had to assume responsibility as I swayed to and fro' with sick-bowls and swilled more drugs.  In my early-illness state of health, I had failed either to leave a mobile number or a key to the house.  We have good neighbours who had spent time trying to contact us, and then at least two hours in the dark, scraping snow and ice from under a hedge in an attempt to locate our stopcock, and further time breaking into the garage.  They had also called the local water company - whose van arrived three days later.

Christmas Eve and Day were a combination of video watching (I have revisited most of the Disney collection), and a determination to celebrate made only possible by doubling all recommended doses and borrowing from my sister-in-law's medical supplies.

My first full day on the slopes was notable for one reason. It was -16 degrees Celsius, at the bottom of the chairlift.  My freeze-dried complexion warranted comment upon our return.

We made it back to Somerset, safely.  On New Year's Eve, our one-day Christmas Day preparation, I washed a necessary number of socks and essentials, hammered on the supermarket door at dawn, collected dogs from kennels and listened to a diatribe from the owner (a local councillor) about the "ridiculous rubbish collection."  On my way to collect the guinea pig from her holiday home, I called in to see our neighbours.  And grovelled.

Having given gifts of thanks, I moved on.  The turkey was collected from the butcher.  "You'll have to leave it out all the time until you cook it.  It hasn't really defrosted yet.  See!"  He poked at the large bird obligingly and when I returned home, having dropped off a child at a train station, I placed the turkey on a platter next to the cooker.  The kitchen fug would help to di-ice the fowl.  I left a ham simmering, whilst I wrapped presents hastily and not terribly secretly. And then, with mince pies sitting on the side and cooling; I made the roulade, put it in the oven and ten minutes later I heard it.

"Click. Click. Click..."  The dual-fuel cooker had run out of bottled gas.  The hot plate on the electric side is broken, which left one fan oven and a warming plate to cook Christmas lunch.

So, on New Year's Eve, when you were perhaps preparing to celebrate, or sitting back and relaxing, I passed the fourteen-year-old (who had spent the morning in his pyjamas), a wrapped and labelled present to place under the tree.  He had to cross the kitchen and a reception room to undertake the task.  Some suggestions regarding possible ways he might help the whole Christmas Day theme to take place, elicited the response, "But they all sound like jobs."

I didn't kill him, but I nearly cancelled Christmas.