December Will be Magic Again

It will surprise no one who has read this blog, even occasionally, to know that my favourite month of the year is December. As a Christmas fan, how could it not be? It is a month of anticipation and a month of magic.

You have music that’s different from any other time of the year. Now, I realise that not everyone likes Christmas music, but it’s music that is tonally different, both in terms of the instruments and the lyrics. For me, the really special thing about the music is the way it brings memories of Christmas Past flooding back. When I hear Slade or The Wombles I am a kid again, looking forward to the wonder of Christmas morning. When I hear Band Aid or Shakin Stevens I am a teenager who is absolutely obsessed with music and I remember drinking and singing with my friends. Now, as I hear my children word perfect on those same songs I feel like I have done a good job in passing on my enthusiasm.

Advent is a special time of the year too. Opening those doors on the calendar and seeing the pictures was always a massive part of the month for me. I prefer pictures to chocolates. There’s so much more simplicity and beauty to a different picture every day than there is to a piece of chocolate. I am not a huge fan of chocolate in any case, but when you eat it, it’s gone, whereas the picture is still there to look at. It was always special to open that last door on December 24 and know that you were just one day from the big day of the year.

Christmas Day itself can be fun, it can be stressful, it can be sad, but it’s a time to either celebrate or to get off the treadmill and attend to your own needs. Yes, those needs can involve shutting yourself away and trying to reconnect with who you are, but Christmas Day and Boxing Day, and New Year’s Eve can give you that opportunity. Even if you don’t like the festive season, you can take that once a year opportunity to take stock, either to count your blessings or to think of ways in which you might be able to improve things in the year ahead.

There is so much in this world that is bad and getting worse, but Christmas is a time when people around you seem to be more reasonable and more relaxed. Even commuting up to London as I did for 20 years in and around Christmas, you saw more smiles or at least fewer frowns as we all looked forward to the much needed break from work. Here, I want to pay tribute to those people who work during the Christmas season, keeping our hospitals running, keeping us safe and keeping others cared for when they are in mental or physical ill health.

Finally, it is the time of year when we think of others and we donate to charities more often than we do at other times. Any month that opens our hearts and our wallets so readily can’t be all bad, can it?