Fragments of Random Christmas Memories

Christmas Eve 2002.
Remember my manager at the petrol station gave us a £50 bonus, and I bought an album by Opeth and a graphic novel by a Polish artist whose name I could never pronounce, let alone recall. Remember walking up the grey road to Flo's house, where I lived, and the strangeness of not being at home on Christmas Eve. Flo was away for Christmas and I had the flat to myself. On Christmas Day I went round Valerie's house for dinner. There was an older friend of hers there, and her then-boyfriend. They weren't to last for long - only days if I remember correctly. Might have been other flatmates there too, but they are lost now beyond memory. The dinner was very nice. I was impressed by the level of cooking skill displayed, and the ease at which such skills were deployed. I drank too much wine, and went home relatively early, fell asleep in the empty flat just past nightfall and woke up on Boxing Day where I was somewhat ill. By the time I started my afternoon shift at the petrol station I felt much better.

Christmas Day 2007.
Back at my parents place in Cornwall. Felt okay on Christmas Eve on my usual walk across the dunes to St Piran's Cross. Christmas Day comes, and I begin to feel somewhat unsettled. Deep exhaustion, and not just an exhaustion of the body, but seemingly of the soul too... Retreat back to bed with Nurofen and cans of diet coke. Feverish sleep, feverish dreams. Time melting into one long 24 hour flu illness. Even missed the Doctor Who special. That same influenza-hallucination I've had before about 'having to balance the temperatures'. I remember achieving this sometime in the small hours. That feeling of triumph - I begin to feel better. I have no idea what 'balancing the temperatures' mean now I am not ill. I think it may be something to with when the fever breaks and you begin to feel better and your temperature comes down.

Boxing Day 1997.
At my parents old place in Cornwall, in St Columb Major. Endless phone calls trying to repair a relationship that never worked. Incense smoke (the incense stick were a present from her), and a small window looking out onto a white-winter landscape I can no longer remember. Turkey smell and condensation on the glass. Websites about tarot cards. Reading interviews with And Also The Trees and Tom Baker's autobiography. Listening constantly to Suspiria's album 'Drama', as if there might be some resolution in songs such as 'Awfully Sinister' and '(now we see) The Swine'.

December 27th 1998.
Alone in the house on London Road Worcester. Happy with those four floors of early Victorian architecture to roam in. No-one back from the Christmas break yet. Writing songs on the guitar, heading into town to buy albums from the Christmas sales. Remember Woolworths was still open. The statue of Elgar at the entrance to the High Street where I used to meet Ruth. Talking with Corin on the phone, she tells me tales of the ghosts of black dogs, but I am only a little uneasy at being in such a large, old house on my own.

December 28th 1996.
Bracknell.
The Followers.