All Change for Christmas

Things are different now

By Tania Brown

I spent Christmas 2019 working hospital shifts until Christmas Eve. Using logistical planning worthy of the British military I shopped, attended two concerts and a Nativity play in three different schools (on the same day of course), bought and wrapped gifts, decorated the house, attended two work parties, entertained my extended family, offended my mother over our choice of food, and my aunty over allowing our 17-year-old to have a beer, and I cried myself to sleep on Christmas Night. I spent Christmas 2020 working on the front line in COVID care. My family celebrated the day without me or a turkey and I cried myself to sleep on Christmas Night. Last year, in early December, while discussing how much of a ‘normal’ Christmas might be possible, my husband announced, ‘I don’t want to go back to normal Christmases.’ And suddenly I loved him more than ever. Last year we kept Christmas small, just us and the kids and a small twinkly tree. We ate chocolate for breakfast, played board games, went for a walk, watched a film, ate my husband’s amazing sticky Chinese chicken wings for lunch, read books, played cards, then ate Christmas pudding for supper followed by marshmallows toasted on the fire...I relaxed completely and shed no tears. This year I asked what everyone wanted to do. The consensus was that last year was great but there were some aspects of our previous Christmases that my kids and my husband missed. So, we took the chance to recalibrate the festive season, and this is what they came up with.

Things we loved about Christmas last year:

NO HOUSE GUESTS (everyone) Playing board games (everyone) Toasting marshmallows (the kids) Long walk (me and husband)

Things we missed about Christmas last year:

Singing in the church carol service (my husband) Ice skating (everyone) Going to see The Nutcracker (ballet-mad ten-yearold) Attending the Christmas lights switch-on (everyone) Family tobogganing night in the snow dome (everyone)

New things we’d like to try this year:

Go to a local stately home to see the lights (everyone) Go to a German market (husband and me) Make a gingerbread house! (the kids) We’re still hosting immediate family for a couple of days between Christmas and New Year, and extended family are invited to visit for one of those days. Not everyone is happy about this state of affairs but I’m not going back to the pre-2020 madness of festive martyrdom, trying to be all things to all people and stressing over whether everyone else’s Christmas is perfect at the expense of my sanity. If Covid showed us anything, it’s that life is precious, fragile, and unpredictable. It forced us to make decisions about who we wanted to spend our time and energy on. The pandemic was a catalyst for change for our family, and I suspect it might be the same for other folk too. Will Christmas ever be the same? I don’t know, but different doesn’t mean worse. We can make new traditions that are more personal and meaningful than before and may even look back and wonder why we didn’t shake things up earlier.