Gay Christmas, On-Call Rotas, and Other Festive Traditions

A Christmas Eve note, with thanks and minimal Brussel sprouts.

Morning All,

For anyone who has neglected to check the calendar the moment they wake up, I am very pleased to inform you that it is officially… Christmas Eve!

With that setting the tone for the day (which may mean that you’re doing the last touches on prep you’ve been doing for weeks, or you’re running around like mad in the Big Tesco looking for fucking Brussel Sprouts - no judgement), I just wanted to pop into your mailbox to say both “Geseende Kersfees!” and a little note that I will be a little bit less “online” over the next few days.

Photo by Tadeusz Zachwieja on Unsplash

It’s sadly not because I’ll be disappearing under a mountain of turkey and ham, but, because I am doing what will be my second last on-call for the NHS and potentially my last on-call ever over Chrimbo. Husband is also on shift, as is usually the case for this time of year (in the either Christmas or New Years off, the latter always wins). No martyrdom required, btw, this is just how December tends to look in our house, and we do it because it’s what we do.

We didn’t always do it this way, of course - South African Christmas has always been a very different affair, with bucketloads of sunlight, usually a braai going, sunscreen and swimming and questioning your life choices after overeating in 35 degree heat.

I do miss that a little bit sometimes, but, I feel like I’m double registered on the Christmas account now, with nearly a quarter of my whole life’s Christmasses now having been in the UK. I’ve come to love the darkness, the cold, the carb and the small rituals that have been built up over years.

I unfortunately missed a big one this year, our 1 December erecting of the Christmas tree as I was busy dealing with some parental issues in South Africa, but this will be made up for next year when I finally get my way and get a real Christmas tree, and it’ll be so big that it’ll take us a full two days to decorate. Where it will go is a future bear worry, and I will motivate for this under the auspices of giving our ageing fur daemon a playground for a few weeks.

Now, working also doesn’t mean that there will be no Christmas celebrations at all, because one of our yearly traditions that has built up over the decade or so that we’ve lived in the UK is Gay Christmas, which is being held this evening! Whoop whoop!

It’s our annual Christmas Eve affair that’s hosted by friends we made when we first moved here (it involved wearing Tuxedos in the Duke of Wellington on our very first New Years Eve, glitter in very weird places, the attempted patting of a police horse and so much gin that the subsequent hangover lasted for what felt like several weeks). It generally involves truly excellent food (the last Gay Christmas involved some truly immense caviar, stuffed quail and a ham that had me seeing visions), very strong opinions and trying to put the world to right before the last train home. I love it with all my heart.

I did also just want to say a proper thank you to everyone though - the last six months have been… a lot.

In good ways and busy ways and bad ways and overwhelming ways and exciting ways. A heady mix of a lot of things happening, thousands of words written about them and a veritable whirlwind of the best activity possible, and I am so grateful that I was able to share so many of these moments with all of you.

It does genuinely still astonish me a bit that so many of you have chosen to read along, share, argue gently (and not so gently), buy books, send coffees and generally keep my sanity and this whole operation afloat.

So, to end with, I do hope that wherever you find yourselves over these next few days - working, resting, celebrating, avoiding your racist uncle, surrounded by people or fiercely protecting your own space - I hope it’s gentle on you.

Merry Christmas, Geseende Kersfees, Happy Holidays, Nollaig Shona and Joyeux Noël - I’ll see you all next week!

Much Love,
Bear