Paying Ready Attention

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...

Condensation trickles down the outside of my un-Muslim drink and pools where the glass meets the table.  The drink is a temperature perfect for a desert evening, even if it’s not authentically Omani.  Late to bed gulls fly in military formation across the pale horizon.  Gentle sea songs drift up from the beach as waves rush and retreat.  Fishing boats drift, black shadow puppets, beyond the wave breaks. People, possibly fishermen, standing in knee deep water tend to the ropes the hold the boats firm to the shore.  The boats are wooden and timeless. On how many evenings has such a scene played out?  A long day of lows and highs winds towards its end.  It feels a long way from home and a short way from sleep.  But as ever, the anticipation is supplanted by adrenaline of surprise. Out of the corner of my eye I notice something, a shape, flicker through the pale glow thrown from the lights that stud the grass and hedges....

Coffee? CoFFee? Coffeeeeeeee? Coffeecoffeecoffee? Coffcoffcoffee? The flight attendant sounds as bored as I feel.  My legs don’t feel at all, although, bizarrely, my feet ache.  You know it’s a long flight when breaking the “four hours to go” barrier feels like an achievement.  The engines drone. The pages of a book flick over, their contents read but immediately forgotten, a process that passes time but brings no enjoyment or understanding.  It reminds me of RE at school.  For some reason I stifle a yawn.  Three hours and fifty-eight minutes to go.  Sleep. Film. Angry Birds. Read. Dubai! (Brief relief) Hurried transfer. Muscat, Oman. Ah – a shower beckons.  No Bags. A shower recedes.  Relief recedes.  Stress gives me an energy hit to counteract the lack of sleep. After twenty minutes of fruitless searching I give up and come to the fogged brain conclusion that my bag is taking an extended break in Dubai...