A Contrasting Christmas.

 Wednesday 22nd October 2025

Mum was talking this morning about going out for dinner at the garden centre one day this week. She says that now there’s more reason, she’d like to go all out on decorating the house for Christmas this year. She wants to see how much another tree would be and to look at the decorations they’ve got in stock.

I suggested it might be a bit early, but she seems to think the displays will already be up.

Anyway, that was neither here nor there — but somehow it set my mind wandering back over past Christmases. Just that small, cheerful conversation with Mum was probably more genuine excitement for Christmas than I ever remember feeling before.

As I lay on my bed later, I found myself thinking how last Christmas was the best I’ve had so far. Grandfather was too ill to cause any trouble, and there’d been plenty of preparation beforehand, which made it feel properly festive. Cindy made a lovely dinner.

The year before had been a very different story. That was the year I learned I was to be sent away to Scotland “for my sins.” I was in the dog house — quite literally — and my Christmas dinner came in a dog’s bowl, as did every meal I had then. My birth dad, bless him, quietly transferred it onto a proper plate once my birth mother wasn’t looking and brought it up to my room for me. By then it was nearly cold. I didn’t get a present that year.

The Christmas before that, my only present was a bathroom gift set — the very one I’d bought my birth mother for her birthday two months earlier. I should have known she wouldn’t use it.

I can still picture her sad little Christmas tree, perched on a table to make it look bigger, with its tangled tinsel and dusty decorations. She hated the bother of taking things down, so after Christmas she’d shove the whole tree, still decorated, into a plastic bag and store it in the garage until the next year. About a week before Christmas, she’d haul it out again, ready for when all her parcels from Amazon arrived.

She’d buy herself stacks of presents and spend the whole day opening them slowly, one by one, while I watched and tried to look excited. When I once asked why Dad and I only got one each, she told me it was a mother’s right — and that one day, when I had children of my own, I’d get lots too.

The rest of her day was spent eating chocolates and drinking whatever she’d bought herself. I mostly stayed in my room, watching festive TV shows alone. My birth dad spent the day cooking, clearing up, and running after her — which was just the way things always were.

Going back to school after Christmas was the worst part. Everyone would be full of stories about what they’d been given and where they’d been. A few of the kids went away somewhere snowy and came back talking about sleigh rides with real reindeer. I loved the thought of it but hated the way it made me feel.

I kept quiet and to myself, having nothing to tell. If anyone asked, I’d try to dodge the question by saying we didn’t celebrate Christmas. That only led to more awkward questions, so in time I learned to lie.

Thinking about all this now, and the way Mum was talking earlier, made me weep a little — not so much for the past, but for the future. Just the simple thought of going out with her to look at Christmas decorations has already made this the best Christmas I can remember. And there are still two months to go yet.

Later this evening, after tea, Mum was sitting by the fire making a list of things we might need — fairy lights, ribbons, a new wreath for the door — and she asked what colours I liked best. I burried my face into dad's arm so as to make him part of it. Outside, the night was cold and clear, the first stars would be showing over the fields. Inside, the room was golden with lamplight and the soft ticking of the clock. I sat watching her write, feeling a quiet, unexpected happiness — the kind that settles in gently and makes you realise how far you’ve come, and how good it feels to belong.