Forget the old Christmas 'rules'. I've just invented some much better ones
Christmas has started already but you don’t need to panic just yet
A trip into town is all you need to know that it’s Christmaaaaas! as shops and pubs outdo themselves with enough lights and sparkle to ensure Edinburgh is visible from space, never mind that the last trick-or-treater has only just collapsed into a sugar coma.
And apparently there are ‘rules for Christmas’. Things like you must have flowers as a centrepiece on the table or candles should always be red, while families should wear matching pyjamas for Instagram. But here are some alternatives.
One, find yourself a friend or family member or someone in your street who has a birthday late in December and support them in their fruitless but spirited endeavour to refuse to engage with Christmas until that’s been thoroughly and properly celebrated.
This means you can go around declaring “too soon!” as Edinburgh bursts into Yuletide all around you with every hospitality outlet busy festooning their frontages and bolting down their giant nutcracker figures and baubles to keep them safe from abduction by over-enthusiastic revellers. That’s not to say you can’t book the panto (oh yes you can) or enjoy a skate in town while you’re avoiding shopping.
Bring back the Snowman
Two, enjoy the Christmas adverts without engaging and rushing to the shops/online. Too soon! (see above). You can’t blame the market for cashing in on the most wonderful time of the year.
So well done John Lewis for exploring masculinity with a mid-life crisis-ridden father reliving his 90s rave youth and mutely hugging his equally existentially confused son in a non-verbal embrace in the living room (didn’t know John Lewis sold choons, maybe it’s the ‘vinyl players’ they’re flogging).
Meanwhile his female life partner and daughter (unless they’re staff) aren’t bothering to ponder their relationship but are dutifully clearing away the Christmas Day debris and setting up a table for yet another meal in time-honoured, gender-prescriptive fashion.
If you listen carefully, despite the strains of Labrinth’s reimagined Where Love Lives, you can hear the older female fretting about what she’s done with the new glasses she bought (in John Lewis obvs) – she needs to get organised, lazy mare.
Subtle, not. Bring back The Snowman. As for The Grinch – dead to me now. What’s he doing supermarket-dashing a food shop in November when he’s meant to be holding out and stealing Christmas until the very last heart-warming minute? He had one job.
Don’t choke a dolphin
Three, always go low rent with your decorations and re-use the lifetime of Christmas tat you’ve already accumulated. Go gaudy or go home.
It’s a mistake to crash around outside with secateurs cutting down innocent foliage to be draped with strings of fairy lights in a bid to stage a wholesome green Christmas.
Much better for the planet to drag out the plastic and glitter (we didn’t know!) baubles along with the cardboard-and-glue efforts any offspring saddled you with over the years and re-use it.
Homespun is in, look at Gwyneth and Meghan. Lovely. And you can’t throw it away anyway or you’ll end up choking a dolphin. Show you care.
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