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| Pretty twinkly lights |
Now, any child with a rudimentary grasp
of mathematics2
knows that receiving birthday presents in the same month as Christmas
presents does not mean that the birthday presents have magically
multiplied. There is the same number of birthday presents, and now
you’ll have to wait a whole year before receiving any more
presents, unlike all those smug summer babies who’ll get a second
chance to get the much-longed-for My Little PonyTM
Dream CastleTM in a few months’
time.3
In fact, one is frequently worse-off, as the lazier of one’s
relatives will pass over two identical gifts, saying “here
is a Christmas present for Michael, and a joint
Christmas-and-birthday present for Kathy”, and assume that just
because Kathy is only five years old, she will not have remembered
that Michael also got a birthday present in November.4
Still, it’s hard to blame the grown-ups sometimes – just because
it’s December, that lump of plastic tat in the Argos catalogue for
which you have yearned all year, and been counting down the
days until you can unwrap the box and unleash the Sylvanian Families
Caravan With Detachable Horse, will have gone up in price by at least
20%. Thanks, shops. And that’s before I even mention the problems
people have with finding wrapping paper which doesn’t have holly or
robins on it!
It’s not just the presents that have
the potential to suck though. Not by a long shot. Y’see, the really
really irritating thing about a birthday in December is
Christmas. Christmas is, according to my calendar, the 25th
of December. You’d think therefore I ought to be able to have a
nice pleasant birthday, doing birthday things, and worry about
Christmas afterwards, wouldn't you?
Nope.
My local Wetherspoons’ has had
Christmas decorations up since the 20th of November. Bloody Chris Bloody Evans on the radio was shouting about it being “the
fifth day of Christmas!” No, you twat, it’s the fifth day of
December, there is a difference. The DJ on Capital Radio (who
I turned to to avoid the Radio Two twattiness, and is marginally
less annoying than Chris Evans, despite claiming to like home-made
gifts “because I’m an aquarium”5)
was blathering on about it being “nearly Christmas” on the 7th
of December. The high-street supermarket was blaring out naff
Christmas songs on the 3rd of December,6
as if the place wasn’t noisy and unpleasant enough on a Saturday.
Spontaneity is impossible - Tim arranged a little surprise
get-together-with-friends for me, but the pub was packed with
Office-Xmas-Let’s-Get-Slaughtereds, and it took a while to find a
restaurant which was able to fit a group of seven in without
pre-booking.
I’m not sure where I’m going with
this little diatribe. Our family custom is to put the tree up on my
birthday – two weeks before Christmas – but I know several
December babies whose families wait until Christmas Eve before
decorating the house, as is more traditional. This gives me a fairly
definite “Christmas is permitted to start now” date, which means
that I’ve noticed that Christmas genuinely is getting celebrated
earlier and earlier each year, and this year feels especially bad.
I like Christmas, I genuinely do. I’m
not like my brother, who goes to pieces over Christmas shopping, and
has one of those black “Bah Humbug” Santa hats. I love the
twinkly lights and the tinsel and the dark starry nights with Orion
in the sky. I love the fact that I get to do exciting things on my
birthday – this year I went ice-skating in Somerset House, which I
wouldn’t have been able to do if I was a summer baby. I love the
time off work, and visiting Tim’s family, and open fires, and good
food, and mulled wine and Midnight Mass, and yes, I love the
presents. It’s just that I love it all at Christmas time,
not on the first of December! Please, on behalf of December babies,
give us a chance to celebrate our birthdays without drowning in
Christmas!
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| Moonrise over Oxford Street |
1
You know, the type who scream when they see a slug, and think that
girls should wear pink frills and play with dollies. They say things
like “Does oo want to be a nursey-wursey when oo gwows up, and
take care of people?” and look a bit nonplussed when you respond
with something like “Actually, I can’t decide. I’m
contemplating forensic toxicology, but oceanography looks fun too.
Want to see the slug I just found?”
2
Which is any child over the age of three. That’s why birthdays and
birthday presents exist – it’s to teach children how to count:
“Hooray! I have seventeen presents this year! That’s three more
than last year!”
3
In my family we have a half-birthday tradition, where one receives a
bar of chocolate or a book six months after one’s actual birthday.
It goes a little way towards offsetting this problem.
4
That’s the other thing children learn from birthdays: life is
essentially unfair.
5
Honestly, I swear she said that!
