FOR ONE DAY ONLY

I'm a huge traditionalist. It's unfashionable, un-politically correct and probably punishable to come out and say so, but I want Christmas to be 100% Christian. I don't mind embracing other religious celebrations, acknowledging other feasts, eating other foods, singing different hymns but for one day a year I want Christmas to feel like it belongs. I want a virgin Christmas, not the bastardised version we're so often dished up. This means no weird, deeply modern hymns. No Heston Blumenthal puddings. No Peppa Pig advent calendars. No Disney-themed Christmas lights. No clever Christmas cards that say things like " Keep Calm it's Only Christmas" and definitely no designer-decorated Christmas trees. It's all just wrong.
Christmas properly observed is one of those holidays that needs no improvements -  ideally it provides a benchmark to family life, reflecting the ebb and flow of time. It's a rite of passage.
For not only is Christmas a story as old as time, how we celebrate it should reflect a lifetime of family traditions. The decorations, like the memories, should be acquired through the years. The crumpled angel made at nursery school so long ago is a sweet reminder that the 6 foot young man still asleep upstairs was once the blonde toddler that fearfully posted a huge sign on his bedroom door saying " Don't come in Father Christmas. And NO ho, ho, ho's.....". The frail father that you help to his seat was the same man that once made the magic work for you, the certain knowledge that no bread sauce tastes quite as good as your mothers, and the fact it's absolutely imperative a Quality Street be eaten before breakfast on Christmas morning are all little scraps of certainty in an uncertain world.
It's the monotony of Christmas that makes it wonderful. We can all go off-piste every other day of the year. It's great to embrace new cultures, to be alternative, to try different things -  but for one day only I like  time to stand very, very still.