Christmas Day 2018

It was never going to be an easy Christmas Day given that empty seat at the head of the table, but David took on the mantle of His Lordship, orchestrating the wine consumption beautifully.
I will never forget HL telling me at Christmas time last year before he had a hint of anything untoward that he didn’t believe he would see another Christmas. I do think there are people who have the ability of foresight not available to the rest of us. I chose not to believe him. How wrong I was.

I did feel rather discombobulated in the morning, waking for the first time in my life to an empty house on Christmas morning. None of the little perks of prosecco and smoked salmon or the exchange of parcels involving fighting with sellotape, but there is some familiarity in having the usual muesli and listening to carols on Classic FM. And of course there were phone calls from the family from Oman and France to Bath and Elgin, not forgetting Glasgow.

With “the bird” safely in its roasting tin and all the accompaniments in their respective pans, I went out for a walk round the policies and found that people smiled and said “happy Christmas” as I passed- well the older people did, the younger students don’t notice anyone over the age of 40.
Back home I still had time to watch “The Lady in the Van” by Alan Bennett on playback. HL and I saw the stage production in London many years ago, and I have also enjoyed the film before but I could watch it many times and still find it fascinating.
All that remains is for David, Luca and Lucy to appear and Christmas will start properly.

PS for the second year running, the roast potatoes were forgotten and had to make a belated appearance at the end of the meal. I blame the Prosecco. Nobody minded- they had all been on the Prosecco too.