Picture this. It’s Christmas day and you’re having lunch with family and – family. It’s never an easy task to choose which family members and boyfriends and girlfriends and inlaws and outlaws to celebrate with, and with the limited space around the table you have to choose wisely. I’m thinking not even baby J knew who to spend his first Christmas with.
The last two days are flashing before your eyes: as the days before Christmas are spent wrestling against herds of people to grab the last-minute pre-made prezzies in M&S or in a present-wrapping frenzy and where did the tape go? How is it you have five pairs of scissors that all disappear mysteriously when you really need them? No one knows, and many parcels go wrapped in seven layers, bulky folding and so much tape no bugger can open them anyway.
You awake from your daydreaming as an older relative gets smashed on egg-nogg and falls into the Christmas tree with a rustle, making the baubles bounce like high-pitched pingpong balls. Old family members occupy the comfy chairs and old memories occupy the table. You don’t know any of the names that are mentioned but you’ve heard them a million times before, so you nod when needed and laugh when everyone else seems to.  You try to make conversation with the third cousin twice removed who’s sitting next to you, whom you’ve only met before at funerals, but the chat is like an amateur tennis match and you both soon silently agree to stop trying.
As sherry goes, old family disputes bubble to the surface in a fondue of emotion and there’s at least one elephant in the room larger than the turkey. All the year’s hopes and dreams were carefully whipped into the Yorkshire puddings and god forbid the turkey is dry.
After unwrapping the Guinness Book of Records that you will glance through once, that novel you’ve already read, and home-knitted gloves that slip off your hands, you start to think of a system to finish all the chocolates you’ve received by February.  Perhaps you could write the schedule down in one of your annual “cute animals” diaries that you also got.
So, you’re probably feeling the celebrations could call it a day. Apart from anything else, by this time most of the family feels they’ve eaten too much and start to fidget. Time to go home and confront New Year’s resolutions. The Yorkshire puddings were a disappointment and the turkey was dry. God forbade nothing.

Part of me wants to wrap this article up in a pretty package and make Christmas seem much more beautiful than it is, and part of me keeps on thinking that there might be something to this celebration after all. A perfect Christmas exists about as much as Santa Clause, but it’s the fact that you believe in it which is the magic.
The previous year’s celebrations were like a dress rehearsal for this year. And yet- you do pick the glass ball up to give it a little shake so the glitter becomes a blizzard around the little odd snowman. And you do actually feel rather certain that this year the Yorkshire puddings will be puffy. And, as a matter of fact, I’m rather looking forward to eating stuffing and wearing red stockings. So close your eyes, click your heels together and say ‘I do believe in Christmas, I do believe in Christmas, I do believe in Christmas…!’