Christmassness Tue, 19th Dec 2006

I did not go to the office party. Instead we had an old friend visit on Saturday. It had been a long time, so it was nice for Mike to finally meet Olivia. Just before he arrived we managed to put up the Christmas tree. The lights failed and Ruth had to dash to the shops and get a new set for a quid. It looks lovely despite what she says! We then tackled clearing one of the spare rooms for Mike — and discovered a lot of dripping at the top of the sash window! We initially put down a towel, but in the end I managed to ducttape the problem away for a while.

Ruth found a fabulous website and asked for help — but it seems that rather than the problem being a leaky window, water is coming from the flat above — perhaps their window sill is letting the rain in? Oh dear!

Anyway, we didn’t let this ruin our weekend! We strolled around Braehead (which was subjected to that urban myth that there was a terrorist threat and resulting chaos for shoppers — so it was reasonably quiet) and tried to get ideas for gifts. Mike asked me to drive his new Turbo Diesel car — it was a Volkswagen, but I cannot recall the model. Mike says he gets 400 miles to a tank, even so it was very pretty nippy, but on the downside, I thought the interior felt cheap and plasticky — and I disliked the blue and red dash lights. To each his own; Mike loves those colours! while I find green more to my own taste. We enjoyed getting into a mess with Mike’s GPS and smart-phone combination! Nothing can figure out Glasgow’s road system!

Everyone came round to ours to see Olivia and Mike — we had a very busy house and a serious amount of pizza was eaten! We got a roaring coal fire going in the lounge and let our tums digest the food!

On Sunday we visited Mama’s — she was in great form, and we stayed longer than usual. What a shame for my older brother who lost his keys — including his only car key! He’s stuck until Mercedes send a new one in five days time! He was telling me that he will probably have to have the car towed to the dealership — just to have the key programmed to the car’s security system — what a costly mistake and great inconvenience for old Bill!

Funnily enough, we had just watched Larry David on TV — and he’s going on about how he has a system with DVDs so that the disk and the box cannot be separated! On his deathbed — and even in the afterlife, he’s going on about his ‘system’. I laughed at the fact that I had just lectured Bill stating that I do not lose my keys because I have ‘a system’!

I laugh at Seinfeld and Larry David because of the similarities to my own life — especially my family! Mama said on the phone last week to buy ourselves Christmas gifts, to get anything we wanted, and she’d pay whatever the cost was. She regretted being unable to shop herself, but that was what she wanted to do.

Obviously we would never take advantage of that offer — and go buy a couple of Vacheron Constantin watches or anything like that. But my sister Marge called in a panic on Saturday (just as we were all leaving for Braehead) saying that she has a system for Mama’s Christmas gifts — drawing cheques that she just signs. We said “whatever”… but when we were visiting on Sunday, Mama said to ignore Marge and stick with her original plan!

So now we’re stuck in between these two! On top of that Billy seemed convinced for a while that Olivia had taken his keys! Oi! Larry David — write that up!

Olivia visited the dentist with Ruth — and allowed the dentist to look inside her mouth. It’s all part of the process. They then visited Ruth’s former office and colleagues — Ollie was a big hit. In fact Ruth’s been getting about quite a bit with the wee one — lots of tot’s parties, lunches and stuff! Busy lives indeed (I cannot keep up).

Olivia’s almost talking now — she’s learning to be cheeky, and throws at least one tantrum per day. Remarkably, she’s talking to the TV, repeating words she hears, and she knows a lot more about what we’re saying than she lets on!

The bump’s doing well, Ruth too — although her back gets twinges as the baby is on a nerve at times. The wee thing is kicking more each day, and Ruth has a standard appointment with the midwife tomorrow. We are all meeting up for dinner in Paisley later, so I shall take the car to work.

Speaking of back-pain, my sister Susan had surgery to her spine last week, and is now pain-free for the first time in years. No doubt we’ll bump into her at some point over the festive season.

One strange thing we have noticed is that far too many houses are going over the top with the Christmas lights — have they (a) no taste and (b) no conscience about the waste of electricity and the effects on the environment?

My office is pretty Christmassy — even though we heard on the radio that companies were being politically correct by refusing decorations and trees — and this of course led to the inevitable heated debate about the true meaning of Christmas, the commercialisation of Christmas and religion!

So many people miss the point, too many fail to understand the true meaning of Christmas — and it has nothing to do with religion, nothing to do with decorations, and nothing to do with commercialisation. Christmas is a marker. At Christmas you will recall previous Christmasses — who has died since, what has happened since, good Christmasses, sad Christmasses, — Christmas is the annual stock-take. It’s about bitter-sweet memories and the heady mixture of opposing emotions and other forces. Once a year you can put on a crown and eat a feast — even if you are very poor and the crown is paper, it doesn’t matter.

As I look forward to this Christmas with my pregnant wife and baby daughter, I can easily project years ahead with happy anticipation or just as easily as look back at Christmas past’s ghosts. That is the truth of Christmas, the pure essence of sadness and happiness, hope and despair, and more besides. Maybe those people will look back at their light shows with real regret one day. Then again, probably not!