Christmas Past

Winter festivities, Solstice, and Christmas time - it all approaches so fast once December is upon us, folk become busy and animated with the days passing in a whirl of shopping and organising and just ‘doing’ so it is good to stop and breathe and take in just what may be happening all around us. For us the ‘slow life’ continues, we trundled through November and have slipped quietly into December, which is not to say we don’t pick up the festive vibes, for us it begins in the second week with family celebration days, outings, and meals. There will be old fashioned country style meals of festive game and rich iced cakes and pies, a glass or two, or maybe three… The mead man dropped round the other day and brought a couple of bottles of the amber nectar, the wine rack is not short of a few bottles of red to pass around and our daughter has surely hidden away a bottle of her village show award winning sloe gin to toast the Solstice and returning light. During this time of lists and recipes and letter writing we pause and look back to previous highlights of the December run up to Christmas.

December arrives during a bright frosty spell of weather giving rise to thoughts of crisp white festive seasons, memories of childhood snow scenes, icicles and the need for woolly hats and mittens, not to mention bright red wellington boots and shiny blue mackintoshes.

A trip into town reveals just how early the festive season now begins, suddenly the windows of high street shops sparkle and shine in the early dusk with fairy lights and silver balls and shimmering artificial snow. Strings of blue and white light bulbs have appeared high up across the streets, accompanied by outsized snowflakes and snowmen and bright red Santas. Then all at once, rounding a corner, there in the city centre, beside the market cross, is a tall twinkling fir tree and music is playing through loudspeakers, but amusingly not the festive carols that we expect, to do justice to the magnificent backcloth of the flood lit Cathedral, but festive pop songs belted out by an Elvis look alike, a festive King of

Rock n’ Roll!

After this rude awakening to the festive season, December decides that a damp patch is necessary, but after one particularly damp night the skies are blown clear by a brisk cold wind and just before daybreak a sudden frost forms to the accompanying calls of a lone Tawny Owl. As light dawns the sky is washed with blue and sunshine returns burning off the frost almost as quickly as it appeared. The sun is low and bright, making you squint and shade your eyes as you walk around corners catching its full brightness. Across the lane at the pond all is quiet, the water reflective like a mirror, then suddenly the still surface is all a shiver, ripples blowing before a stiff breeze fanning out into a semi-circle of sparkling diamonds, only to be still once more to reflect again the wintery blue of the sky. Along the muddy path beneath the trees, flocks of Longtail Tits dash about and Dunnocks and Robins and Wrens all sing in turns like soloists from some grand orchestra that awaits its cue. The sunlight bounces off the bleached white of the Birch bark and causes dappled golden shadows amongst the last of the Oak leaves and highlights the sharp ruler straight edges of Pine needles. The woodland floor is coloured all shades of browns and greys suddenly splashed with bright emerald mosses. Brackens and ferns appear almost transparent as the light shines through them and patches of heather, shadowy, purple misty grey. Long dark shadows stripe the path and cobwebs dance in the translucent misty air. Still the stiff breeze persists, suddenly rustling the tops of the tallest pines and just as suddenly it is quiet again, a soft, mellow, peaceful stillness. Later a squirrel scurries across the dry oak leaves, scampering up a trunk, its sharp claws scratching noisily against the rough bark and a gang of squabbling Jays squawk and scream in their rough and tumbling eagerness to be first to win an acorn prize. Later still the air cools substantially and the pale grey horizon hills are topped with bright stripes the colour of ginger beer and lemonade and a froth of pale evening cloud proceeds a sky of twinkling stars. After the brightness of recent days, the day we choose to attend the annual Christmas Market is not the best choice at all, dull grey light greets us in the early morning when all we really desire is frosty crispness. The countryside is quiet and damp, all shades of browns and beige, greys and muted dark greens, low grey clouds and even the magnificent Red Kite, who hangs low over the dark furrowed earth, looks the colour of one of last year’s faded conkers instead of fox tail red. But despite the dullness of the weather the markets are full of bustle and business, colourful with awnings catching the breeze as stall holders call cheerful greetings whilst blowing on their cold fingers. All manner of colourful produce is on display, Christmas cakes with smooth white icing and puddings wrapped in colourful cloths, decorated fairy cakes and gingerbread and oddly shaped rustic bread loaves. Huge cabbages, carrots of multi hues, onions and plaited strings of garlic and Brussel sprouts still clinging to their stalks. Hot snacks and cold snacks and mugs of steaming tea are willingly passed around and consumed with eagerness amongst heaps of holly and mistletoe and green spiky pine trees ready to take home to ‘deck the halls’.

It is a chilly morning spent browsing the stalls so a welcoming coffee shop near the Cathedral draws us into its steamy warmth where we sit and wrap cold fingers around hot mugs. As we sit the clouds outside begin to clear and leaving the cafe behind to cross the crowded, leaf littered Cathedral lawns, a wintry sun shines on us. The hustle and bustle too, is left behind as we drive out of town up over the top of a hill into a world transformed from dull greyness into a patchwork of golden light. From the top of this hill, it seems that half of Hampshire and Sussex is spread out before us, a completed jigsaw puzzle of rich browns and greens of every shade imaginable as the sun picks out a maze of shape and shadow. The very earth of the plough, that earlier was so dull, has taken on a rich tawny colour and stubble fields become amber like golden sands crossed by sharp, dark, long afternoon shadows. The world seems to come alive again just before it is time for it to settle into sleep at the end of another short winter’s day. This brightness heralds the beginning of a few days of bright blue skies and sharp frost that hangs around all through the day light hours making grass and branch alike silver in the shadows where the sun does not reach, until suddenly the end of the week brings rain, rain and more rain and floods and brown mud replace the silvery frost. Streams have overflowed, ponds become lakes and rivers burst their banks, flood plains and water meadows spread out into a shining watery landscape scattered with lines of fence posts strung together with dripping wire, foot bridges and way markers rise from the water marking invisible footpaths, great Oaks stand tall and marooned and copses of Alder and Ash form islands their top branches filled with roosting pigeons. For days the rain comes and goes at its leisure, wind blows hard bending branches then there are spells of sunshine which encourage us to walk out into town, where the last rush of Christmas shopping brings crowds to the shops and puddles reflect streetlamps in the early dusk. The shortest day, Winter Solstice, is quieter, the water levels still high but less rain for a day eases the pressure, leaving piles of leaves and branches and the occasional tin can high and dry on riverbanks, high above the usual water line. But still it is cloudy, the mid-winter night only occasionally brightened by a fleeting glimpse of moon which is quickly covered by more rain bearing clouds. As if taking his cue from the long midwinter night, each subsequent dawn is greeted by the Robin in full song, gone are the quiet morning chirps and twitters and tuneless ticks, the Robin is declaring that daylight is returning and all will be well, the darkness that has enveloped the earth whilst roots and seeds grow and are nourished is being chased away once more and a new growing season is soon to begin. Christmas Day comes in with more darkness and cloud and sudden huge claps of thunder, and lightning to rip apart the darkness with a fearsome scream and a thud and rain so heavy that in moments all is awash, then another flash and a bang leave a silence so strange as the clouds slide eastwards and daylight slowly arrives leaving showers and pale skies and later low golden sunlight to smile upon the festive day.

May your festive season, however you choose to spend it, unfold into a time of peace and safety, filled with beauty and joy. Share the love and the magic, and rejoice in life.

Words and pictures by Artist and Druid © 2022