Today is Christmas day. I’ve spent all day enjoying the food, the wine, the presents, and the company. But there were two things today that stood out. Stood out from amongst the routine of Christmas and made today more special than I could have hoped. I won’t lie, Christmas isn’t an easy time of year for me as a Heathen in amongst a family of Christians, several of whom are vicars. It has been for some years now a time of year when quite by accident I feel alone, struggle to enjoy what is there before me because my head and the surrounding environment seem to have placed themselves against it.
Today started with no difference to all of these times. I daresay that I was miserable throughout a large portion of the scrumptious Christmas lunch, for petty reasons really. The whole family other than I was engaged to begin with offering a prayer to their god and as usual I was the only abstention preferring to offer my prayers and thanks elsewhere. It was however in the gifting section of the afternoon in which today took a pleasant and unexpected upswing in fact I was nearly moved to tears. (totally was.) Whilst I was extremely grateful for the presents everyone had bought me and will get hours of enjoyment out of the books and games it really struck me that the presents that caught me off guard and I will treasure just that little bit more than the others are the ones that have little or no monetary cost attached to them.
One is a 1978 edition of the Silmarillion, gifted to me by my godmother. Now I would be excited about old hardback copies of Tolkien any day of the week, having most of the other editions from around this time. In fact I received those copies from my godmother as well for an 18th birthday present. This honestly excited me so much, it fed my Tolkien addiction and as many people will know I already have most of his works and am constantly looking for other writings. This present was one that honestly showed just how well people know me and as an unexpected gift turned my day around. Being the first present I opened it was the one that really made me feel included. Made me realise that actually although we have a difference in faith they see me as a part of celebrating Christmas as much as anyone else.
Now the other was a sketch. I will include a picture below for you all to see but it was a sketch that my sister Rosslyn had clearly poured hours into drawing. In fact I was literally stunned and unsure of how to react when I received it. My relationship with my sister has not always been strong but for her to draw something for me without me having gone so far as to hint I wanted one. (Although I do want to ask her to draw some characters from my writing!) It made what was a beautiful day already even more special in the company of my family.
Morrigan, artist Rosslyn McCormick
Unfortunately a picture cannot convey emotional meaning nor the true detail.
I guess the entire point of this post was just to say that the gift of the picture especially meant so much to me because of the hours she had poured in to creating this beautiful work from myriad source material.
I hope you all have/had a blessed holiday season
Hugh