Nothing Really Matters

Ever since I was a little girl I’d always loved the annual ritual of putting my Christmas tree up, usually on or shortly after my birthday on the second of December each year. It involved me putting a Christmas film on, usually National Lampoons Christmas Vacation which never failed to amuse me, often with a mug or two of mulled wine, while I painstakingly unravelled and hung the lights on just so, before one by one placing my vast collection of ornaments on the lit up tree - each one with its own memory attached whether it was the little teddy my mum had knitted, a specially sought after bauble I’d tracked down for my sister or the mini can of coke I’d blinged up after we (me, Craig, Cole & Frodo) visited the Coca-Cola lorry some years before. Nothing matching, just things I’d bought or had bought for me, often from abroad too; it was an eclectic mish-mash I loved, topped off with a beautiful angel in white. The finishing touches were the chocolates and candy canes which weren’t to be touched until Christmas Day.

Magical Christmases when Cole was younger.

The Coca Cola lorry during the storm of 2012!

I’d had my artificial tree since my mid 20s in Doncaster so it was about 30 years old, and was well loved but very tatty looking. I’m not sure exactly when or why but after Craig and I split up and I’d moved out to Cwmparc, but I started feeling less and less ‘Christmassy’ and became really anxious about trimming up and started scaling down the process until about three years ago I just couldn’t face putting the tree up at all. Maybe it was around the time of Covid lockdowns or Cole being older, or my mobility getting worse - I know the last Christmas in Cwmparc (Dec 21) was following a really bad bout of IBD flare up following food poisoning, so perhaps that’s why I didn’t feel up to putting it up that year. Then when I moved back to Pentre in April 2022, in an effort to downsize to the new flat, I ended up throwing out my beloved old tree which felt like the end of an era somehow and not really bothered since then as I started going to my friends for Christmas dinner and it just didn’t seem worth putting it up.

I was feeling a bit ‘bah-humbug’ about it all, so I decided this year I would make a proper effort and buy a new ‘ready-lit’ skinny tree to hopefully fit within my cluttered living space and might be less arduous for me to put up. The large box arrived from Amazon at the beginning of November, a few days before I was due to go on my spontaneous trip to Brighton (previous blog here) and thought, I’ll put that up when I get back. When I returned, the big long box loomed in my hallway unopened, with a quiet pressure building rather than excitement. I had also been asked up to my friends for Christmas dinner again, with their beautiful crazy big family who welcomed me like one of their own in previous heart-warming years.

Christmas with the Nash/Hopes!

But something inside me was changing and I couldn’t work out why it all felt so anxious even thinking about the forthcoming festivities. In the past, I’ve often felt at odds spiritually with celebrating Christmas given I hadn’t been to church in oh, so many years, and felt that it has become more of a commercially driven event. I started noticing that even in my limited exposure to live telly or radio that the Christmas adverts were coming in thick and fast and it just all felt so ruddy overwhelming and false. By this time I’d put the new tree box in the storage cupboard, but as I neared the beginning of December and my finances have been tighter than ever this year, I thought why the fuck am I putting myself through all this head-mash and sent the unopened box back before my possible refund window closed. OMG that felt SO good - the ‘tree’ pressure was finally off.

My next hurdle was what to do about accepting or rejecting my dear friend’s kind invitation. I didn’t want to offend anyone but, again, the unspoken pressure was playing on my mind. If I didn’t go, what was the alternative? Cole said he’d been invited up to his girlfriend’s for lunch which I encouraged him to accept, so was I going to spend Christmas Day on my own? How would that look and feel to this new version of myself? I then started to realise that the old rituals belonged to a different version of my life; one with more energy, more certainty, more people orbiting the centre of it. The expectation to recreate the joy and merriness of the season felt heavy, even slightly performative. The season hadn’t changed, but my relationship with it had. What surprised me most was the anxiety. Not sadness exactly, more of a low-level dread, and so I politely declined my invitation with my friends and for the first time, I chose not to force my narrative.

I didn’t put up any decorations, bar a tiny stuffed tree which sat in the corner of my telly for the period. I didn’t send cards, although I did send presents to what’s left of my close family, and I bought Cole a few things despite us agreeing not to buy each other anything! I didn’t try to recreate any magic in miniature. Instead, I let the season arrive quietly. I leaned into stillness rather than sparkle. I allowed winter to be winter, darker, slower, more inward. This wasn’t an act of rejection, and it certainly wasn’t bitterness. It was an act of honesty.

I’ve come to understand that traditions are meant to serve us and not the other way around. When something that once brought comfort starts to create pressure, it deserves to be questioned. Letting go doesn’t erase the memories; it simply acknowledges that life moves, and so do we.

Dinner for one and my fave fry-up days after!

Consciously unchristmassing, for me, has been about releasing obligation, no longer performing joy on cue, keeping it real and spiritually honest. For me it’s been about letting go of unhealthy expectations and embracing new and more soul pleasing rituals, like ordering M&S food for dinner from Ocado, staying in bed snuggled up to Pascal till I can be bothered to get out of bed, spending all day in my jim-jams unwashed and unbothered! Watching what I want on telly (or even working on my bloody year-end accounts if I wanted) - I even watched National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation and it was all bloody brilliant.

Sometimes the most radical thing we can do at this time of year is allow ourselves to change, and to let the season be exactly what it is without all the drama and social expectations.

No, I am not Scrooge or the Grinch, I’m merely trying to thrive in my own little solitary world without being judged or criticised and finding true glimmers and spiritual peace in new places.

And guess what? It worked. I genuinely had the most lovely time.

Merry whatever it means to you...