What Christmas is to Me

It’s the 13th of December, 12 more sleeps until Christmas Day. It is 25°C and I’m dressed in shorts and a sleeveless Shirt, not very Christmassy to say the least. Growing up in South Africa the imagery of Christmas has always been very jarring and I can remember as a child finding the heat rather intrusive upon the Christmas cheer. There’s no snow, and I am most definitely NOT planning on sitting in front a fire for fear of combusting on the spot.

So with all imagery of snow, reindeers and fat men climbing down the chimney what made Christmas, Christmas for me? Thinking back rather nostalgically I sway somewhat uncharacteristically to Beyoncé’s new album (which is amazing and should be on your Christmas wish list!!!!!), fingers slightly sticky from the Sellotape I carefully use to wrap my gifts. My fondest Christmas memories were probably when my great grandfather was still alive. He had a way of transporting me to a new world so effortlessly with each story which still to this day no book or author has managed.

His friend, Dorothy would always visit each Christmas, and my younger brother and I dubbed her aunty “dodo”. In retrospect this name was apt, as she was a unique breed of person, which now sadly is extinct I fear. She would sway me around the living room as we danced to Christmas carols and her favourite was jingle-bell rock sung by a small electric Santa-Clause who would bob from side to side as Aunty Dodo and I did a jive worthy of any Strictly Ballroom(well for my age…).

Back to my great grandfather. He would always sit in this special chair he built himself and it was always a guilty pleasure to steal a moment on it before his entrance to the Christmas Eve dinner. Now dinner was never my favourite, I pride myself in my British heritage but roasts? No thank you.. The dinner party was never about the food or the liquor but the company. Seated at a table of family has a special space in my heart. Then after the meal came pudding, which was always served by my grandmother with the flair of a magician. This mound darkened by pure decadence would enter the room aboard a plate with what seemed to be a moat surrounding its base. It was placed down and with the flick of a match the mound burnt a bright blue. The Christmas pudding once extinguished would be served with my great grandfathers’ favourite – brandy butter. As I type this out I can still taste the rich decadence thereof followed by the taste of metal, a coin! Oh what joy would overcome my young body at the discovery, this is where mom would rather hurriedly step into mommy-mode and break apart my brothers and my portions just in case any more coins should be shyly concealed. Just in case we should choke. (A word of thanks to my mother for her care)

The memories bombard me somewhat erratically now as I delve deeper into this side of my memories which have up until now been seemingly ignored as a given. My brother and I would be given sparklers which we would use to draw images in the pitch black sky which now enveloped the surrounds. What joy such a simple object could bring… It was like I had a wand in hand with which I could transform myself into a prince or fairy(yes a fairy!) and fly away from all I knew to a Disney landscape.

Christmas has become commercialised and I know this is not news but i am grateful that my Christmas memories have not been strangled by the layers of cellophane which covers many gifts. Yes somedays I have to dig beneath the remains of wrapping paper now lacerated by eager hands and scattered on the floor but I know that beneath all the lights, wrapper and fake snow I have a true Christmas.

It may sound rehashed but for me, it’s about the family… Because gifts come and go, snow melts and Santa doesn’t exist.. But family stays, can never vanish and does exist.