Rituals
You place a wreath on the front door and decorate a tree in the front room. You don’t open the main presents until after breakfast, but you can open the ones in the stockings in bed, all together, over-excited and a little short of sleep. The night before I completed the Pocket Stories – an illogical tale based on the contents of our Advent Calendar, full of recurring characters and standing jokes. I did it once, who knows how many years ago, thinking it a one off, but it has become a December staple. A better marker for the journey to Christmas than the decorated shops, which begin in late October and finish on Boxing Day. Slowly we build our own ritual landscape that marks this time of year. We borrow bits from here and there, appropriate pieces we may not agree with, but make sense in the broad brush strokes of all that is around us and sometimes, and if we are lucky enough, we add parts that are new and ours. Part...