It’s got to that time of year again when my daughter-in-law starts nagging me to put up a Christmas tree.  Hers goes up around the beginning of December, but I find that as I grow older I have tended to take my mother’s point of view and sigh.

As as child I don’t ever remember my mother putting up a Christmas tree.  However, there was an artificial one in the loft, and Dad would get it down if I asked him to.  I’d then decorate it and make it look nice, but if it hadn’t been for my efforts my parents would never have bothered with any Christmas decorations.  At the time I couldn’t understand why they would not want a tree in their front room.  What they looked forward to at Christmas (and me too) was the all-night East End parties with the family, where we sang and danced until we could dance no more.

So… scrap the food and scrap the tree and decorations.  I’d give anything to have those parties back again, but the family then were of the older generation and of course have all departed this life.  The young people now would rather sit and look at their phones than sing and dance and it’s not quite the same, and so I consider myself very lucky that I was of an age to experience times when relatives all got together to talk, sing and dance and where there was not a single phone in sight.

I’ll be hosting a get-together for the current generations on Boxing Day.  They’ll eat and talk and the kids will run around, but every few minutes they’ll all be checking their phones to get their fix, because their mobile phone addiction is rather chronic.  There will be music on in the background, which is politely endured by the younger members.  They will play music to me on their phones by bands I’ve never heard of, and I will think myself lucky that I grew up when I did.  However ,I’m sure they will also think themselves lucky that they only have to listen to rock music when they visit us.

It’s a funny old game, this game of life.  At the age of 62 I now realise why my mother could never be bothered to put up a Christmas tree.  What a faff it all is, and it all looks so tacky!  I also don’t make Christmas puddings, mince pies or anything else connected with the holiday season.  As far as I’m concerned it’s all artery-clogging gunk and the body doesn’t need it.  Yeah, it’s all a bit ‘Bah Humbug’, but I for one will be glad when the razzmatazz and hype is over and we can all get back to normal!  I’m not at all religious, and it’s a shame that Christmas is so commercialised for anybody who is.

Oh yes… I forgot… Merry Christmas everybody (ho ho chuffing ho)!  Sam’s got the Christmas tree out of the loft to please the daughter-in-law, and now I’ve got to put the bloody thing up…