Home For Christmas

by Alice Taylor

  As far as we were concerned, of all these publications, the Holly Bough was the best. My mother became an avid reader of it, and sometimes, late at night, when peace reigned in her kitchen, she sat by the light of the oil lamp methodically working her way through its pages. She was not a reader who dipped in and out. My father was not a fan, but Bill was, so he and my mother had long discussions about different articles when he called to see us every night. Because it had so many articles, the reading of the Holly Bough was often spread out over their entire Christmas. When I came to live in Innishannon, the Holly Bough became part of my Christmas, and Uncle Jacky and Aunty Peg also read it in great detail.

  One wet Sunday between the Christmases in 1983, I had my feet up and was reading the Holly Bough. As I read, the thought came into my mind that it was very Cork City orientated. What about us culchies? Surely we deserved more space and more of a voice. Then I came across an article written by a Revd Mr Doherty whom I knew had been a clergyman in Innishannon before my time. I had never met him but had heard of him. Then the thought in my mind germinated. Maybe we could have a parish Christmas publication to give our parish a voice of its own? Maybe Revd Doherty would write an article for us? There were a lot of maybes. Before I had time to suppress the impulse, I wrote Revd Doherty a letter.

  One of the best pieces of advice I ever received in life was to never suppress a good impulse. Do not overanalyse it because then the rational side of your brain will convince the creative side not to go with it and the dream will die. Just go with it. Within days, back came a reply from Revd Doherty to say that he would be delighted to contribute an article to our magazine. The dream was growing wings. Now for the hard graft. No dream takes off without the hard graft. I went around to a few helpful neighbours to ask if they would write articles.

  There is a reluctance in us ordinary Irish people to commit ourselves to paper. Maybe the source of this is the fear that once we put something in writing there is no going back. Another problem is that most of us are afraid of upsetting the neighbours. Worrying about what people will think can often be a huge barrier against putting pen to paper or doing something that we believe is worthwhile.

  Some brave souls did come on board. When the first copies of Candlelight were inspected, those who had not come on board said, ‘Is that all you wanted?’

  ‘That is all,’ we told them. ‘We are not attempting to write Ulysses.’

  Everyone assumed that Candlelight would appear the following year. But, as most of us know, things do not happen simply on assumption. A friend of mine has a very shrewd observation about people. He says, ‘There are those who make things happen, those who watch things happen, and those who ask, “What happened?”’ In our village we are blessed with quite a few people who belong in the first category. We put in more hard graft and a second edition was indeed published the following year. Our Christmas magazine has been going for many years. We have the old reliables who can be depended on to come good most years. We also have those who need to be nurtured, and we begin doing so in late summer.

  Then there are those who, despite annual coaxing, never come good. They are too busy. Some of us perceive ourselves to be far busier than we really are. When confronted with the inquiry ‘How long have I got to do that article?’ the honest answer is, ‘If you want to do it you have plenty of time, and if you do not want to do it you will never have enough time.’

  Despite all kinds of ups and downs, one Candlelight followed another, and, over the years, it has recorded much about the parish that would have otherwise been lost. We have no big committee, just three determined women: Mary, Maureen and myself, good friends who believe in the project. Every year, the first page of Candlelight opens with a picture of a child holding a lighted candle – a symbol of Christmas and the beginning of a New Year. The first candle was lit in 1984.

  When the idea of a parish Christmas magazine first sprouted, there was no big plan that it would go on for decades. It just did, mainly because, once launched, people loved it and wanted it to make an annual appearance. And Mary, Maureen and I believed in it.

  Candlelight is posted all over the world. Last year I met a woman who had left our village many years ago, and I was amazed how familiar she was with parish happenings. When I asked how she was so well informed about village events, she told me, ‘Candlelight. It arrives every Christmas, and I look forward to it every year. It is the highlight of my Christmas.’ So Candlelight, a bit like Kitty the Hare, goes around with the parish news and is part of our Innishannon Christmas.

  Growing up on a farm many years ago, the buying of Christmas presents for each other and for friends was never a problem, simply because there was no such thing as buying Christmas presents, at least not as we know them today. Santa brought presents, and that was it. No money floating around meant no presents. We never missed them, simply because we knew nothing about them.

  An early sign of Christmas was the arrival of the Traveller women. Ordinarily they carried baskets full of clothes pegs, holy pictures and camphor balls. Now the baskets under their shawls took a seasonal turn, brimming over with Christmas paper chains for running across the kitchen, pleated paper skirts for the candle and big brightly coloured paper flowers. We danced around them in delight and with our enthusiasm diluted any chance my mother had of hammering out a good bargain. Once purchased, these wonders were locked in my mother’s parlour press until Christmas Eve, the big day of decorating.

  Finally the day of the school holidays came, and we arrived home ecstatic with expectation. Now it was only a matter of days. The next step was ‘bringing the Christmas’. My mother and father set out early one morning and headed into town on their own. There was usually one or two of us in tow when they went to town but not when they were ‘bringing the Christmas.’ It was an adult-only expedition.

  The previous Saturday, the geese had been carried by pony and crib to the Christmas market, and as a result my mother had money in her pocket. She held back a number of geese, some of which she had plucked and made oven-ready for her town sister and cousins. My father took his favourite friend a bag of his best spuds.

  Strangely enough, geese, and later turkeys, got posted – nationwide as well as overseas. I am not at all sure they always arrived in an edible condition. I can remember posting pounds of butter to England, which at the time seemed perfectly normal but would today be unthinkable.

  We waited all day, bursting with excitement, until, as darkness fell, we heard the pony’s hooves clip-clop down the boreen. We were allowed help carry in some of the boxes and put them on the parlour table. Others my mother insisted on carrying carefully herself. In the boxes were big barmbracks and seed loaves which the shops where we dealt gave as tokens of appreciation for our custom. Sometimes there was a homemade cake and pudding, made by our town aunt, or a wooden box full of black porter bottles from a cousin who had a pub in town. They were all put in a deep press to which my mother alone had the key. Christmas was now safely locked up in the parlour.

  So presents did move around, but they were of a totally practical nature. Even Santa had a practical turn of mind, and I remember getting a new cardigan and jumper once and being absolutely delighted with them. Occasionally he did rise to dolls and wooden toys, which were cherished for years. Toys were as rare as hen’s teeth, and when they did come they were a source of endless play.

  Later, when I had my own children, buying ‘Santa’ brought me immense pleasure. The shrieks of joy on Christmas morning made all the mental scrutiny of deciding on the appropriate gift for each child worthwhile. Starting off with four boys, it was all about building blocks and model trains. When a girl finally arrived, I was delighted to be back into the world of dolls. For her first Christmas, Santa brought my daughter a beautiful doll and pram. They were both bigger than her, and our eldest, who was no longer a believer, informed me with amusement, ‘You bought those for yourself, you know.’ He was right.

  Christmas shopping when you are a work
ing wife with young children has to be a study in time and motion. When I was in that situation, helping to run our village shop and post office, Christmas was hectic. So my Christmas shopping expedition had to be planned with military precision and usually executed in a one-day outing. Hence the need for a well-thought-out list.

  On the morning of that special day, I hit town as soon as the shop doors opened. A child-free day to do the shops was a rare treat, and the challenge to get my list complete was a great stimulant. I began my campaign with pep in my step and began to tick off my acquisitions with immense satisfaction. The secret was to keep focused.

  Before launching on a Christmas present safari, a shopping list has always been high on my agenda. With the belief that most money is hard-earned comes a conviction that if at all possible the spending of it should be sheer enjoyment. A list is the foundation stone of that enjoyment. One might not always adhere to the list, but it is like a road map or a satnav when setting out on a journey. Without some sense of direction, you could finish up going around in circles or, worse still, going nowhere. Worse again, you could end up in the wrong shops.

  Making out a Christmas shopping list can be hugely enjoyable. I love it. It fills me with a great sense of anticipation. In the process, you may discover a few home truths about yourself as well. You begin with your nearest and dearest. Deciding what might give them most joy can be a joy in itself. Then, gradually you work outwards until you find yourself with the guilty-conscience brigade: the ‘duty’ presents. As Shakespeare said, ‘Conscience makes cowards of us all.’ Conscience sometimes demands a high price, and you have to be very careful not to find yourself allocating these recipients more than they deserve. It could be to ease your conscience about your lack of warm feelings towards them. Chances are that this bad judgement overcomes you when drifting around the shops and you get caught up in the tide of the prevailing Christmas euphoria. A wave of goodwill to all your fellow humans suffuses you, including those who have been a bloody pain in the butt for the past year! This is when a list is a stalwart support because with it you have already overcome the guilt that causes bad decisions. Backwards psychology? Maybe. But tried and tested.

  Sometimes when out Christmas shopping your eye can happen on an item that just hits the spot, and you think, Wow, so-and-so would simply love that. It may not be on your list, but it would be far more desirable than the original item. It is great when that happens. For other items, you simply have to trudge around relentlessly. Sometimes you might eventually strike oil, but other times you may simply have to change gear and think in a new direction.

  When I begin to flag and feel that my decision-making capabilities are dwindling, I retire to a city-centre restaurant where I seek out a table in a quiet corner and review the situation over an enjoyable meal. The temptation of a glass of wine is resisted, as lunchtime wine and I do not lead to clear-headed decisions. This is a day for clear thinking.

  Back in action, I forge ahead, and sometimes retrace my footsteps to reconsider an item previously rejected. Eventually I allow myself into a bookshop. One year, I made the mistake of beginning in a bookshop, and that was a disaster. Bookshops are great places for dawdling, and it was too early in the day for dawdling. It was like having the dessert before the main course. But by late afternoon, the bookshop is exactly what the doctor ordered. Having crossed off most of my list, it is time to head home where, when the children were small, ‘Santa’ was hastily bundled into an old wardrobe in Aunty Peg’s spare room next door, the equivalent of my mother’s parlour press.

  In the very early years of my many Christmas shopping expeditions, I committed the unforgivable offence of putting myself before all of humankind. I decided that Christmas was all about joy to the world, and that that world included me. So I bought myself a present. And I have continued to do so every Christmas since. This way, you can be dead sure that you finish up with at least one present with which you are absolutely thrilled. That, for me, is always a book. One of my first self-indulgences in that field was a hardback copy of W. B. Yeats’s poems. He was followed by Patrick Kavanagh, Brendan Kennelly, Ted Hughes, Billy Collins and others. These Christmas presents have enriched my life. And that is what Christmas is all about.

  It was to be a first for us, our very own Christmas market. Our local church was in dire need of restoration, and a Christmas craft fair might be the solution to our problem. The plan was that all the items for sale would be created by hand in the parish. Not one shop-bought item was to be displayed on our stalls. Did we have enough creativity amongst us to come up with goods of sufficient quality? Could we produce enough to provide the variety necessary for a really top-class market? Had we still got the skills to create beautiful things in our own homes?

  A wonderful programme called Hands, filmed and produced by the far-seeing David Shaw-Smith in the 1970s, captured the craft skills being practised across the country. Watching an update programme in which some of the same craftspeople were interviewed was a sobering experience. Many of our crafts have been abandoned. Might we have ‘sold our heritage for a mess of pottage’?

  Lack of money can sometimes stimulate wonderful creativity. If money is readily available to throw at a problem, other possibilities may never be explored. When we Irish were less prosperous, we honed many skills. We baked, knitted, crocheted, sewed, grew our own food, wove and turned wood. When things were broken, we mended and recycled. These skills are now often abandoned for faster and seemingly more efficient solutions.

  What appears in the short term to be making financial sense may in the long term prove to be not so desirable. Because when we bury our creativity, we lose our souls. Our creativity is the oil that eases the wheels of our minds, and an easy mind is necessary for our general well-being. We can pay a high price for putting financial experts in the driving seat. For them, money is the name of the game. One of my bright-brained young friends who is employed in a high-flying financial institution recently had to work over Christmas. ‘Money never sleeps,’ he explained.

  Months before our planned Christmas market, the wheels were set in motion. Creating beautiful handmade things is not a speedy exercise, so time was necessary to give people the opportunity to get going on whatever they felt was their specific creative ability. In each one of us is a pool of creativity, and all around our parish these pools began to stir. People were enthused by the prospect of applying themselves to their chosen hobby or skill for the restoration of their church, which was no longer a thing of beauty – the passage of the years had taken its toll. Nothing stimulates the creative mind like a prospective project. Lacemaking, crochet, patchwork, wood-turning, tapestry, carpentry, painting and knitting were discussed. People exchanged knitting patterns or inquired if there was a need for their wood-carving and carpentry skills.

  Over the summer months we collected rose petals, deadheading the roses in all the gardens to make potpourri. We laid the petals out on cotton sheets in the gardens to be dried in the sun, then filled dozens of wooden bowls – produced by one of our woodturners – with the sweet-smelling sun-dried rose petals. Wrapped in cellophane and labelled ‘Innishannon Potpourri’, they made lovely Christmas stocking fillers. Their exquisite gold labels came from New York, where a parishioner’s daughter was excelling in the world of luxury-goods presentation.

  Next we decided to take on the waxy challenge of Christmas candle-making. With very little experience we equipped ourselves with a glossy book on the art of candle-making as well as with moulds, stearin powder and the other paraphernalia needed for the job. The keys to our success were the big balls of pure beeswax that were stored in an old trunk in the attic – the product of years of beekeeping by my cousin Con, who had kept hives in the back garden.

  We put Aunty Peg’s old heavy preserving pot on the Aga and into it landed the lumps of beeswax. They slowly softened as we gently circled them around the pot with a large wooden spoon. Gradually the wax melted, and as it began to diminish the pot filled with a dark,
rich, golden liquid. With this we had the basic ingredient for our pure wax candles. Having added the other requirements to the pot, we put a taper into a candle mould and carefully poured in liquid wax, endeavouring to keep the wick at the centre. Then we allowed the liquid to rest and the air bubbles to escape. When the wax had settled, we filled in the little well that had formed to give the candle a level base.

  The more candles we made, the more we learnt about the process. Instead of standing the mould in water to cool before the removal of the candle, as the book instructed, we found that putting it in the fridge for a few minutes was more effective and less messy. We also discovered that placing the mould in the freezer for a few minutes helped with the ejection of the candle. The more we made the easier the process became, and we finished up with about fifty satin-smooth candles, all smelling of pure honey. These we stood into solid wooden candlesticks created by our woodturners. They looked good and made lovely Christmas gifts, especially for someone living far from Innishannon.

  Through spring, summer and autumn there were rumours of many hands at work throughout the parish, but it was difficult to know just how many until we let it be known that it was time to bring in the harvest. Bags and boxes of amazing workmanship began to come in. Because our house is big and rambling and in the centre of the village, it was decided to make this the collection depot. Having everything at the one location would make it easier to ascertain what exactly we had for our Christmas market.

  First the return came in a trickle that turned into a steady flow and then finished up in a tidal wave. Bags and boxes filled the large front room, the smaller seomra ciúin and all along the long winding hallway. It was truly amazing. Beautiful lace christening outfits, patchwork quilts, exquisite tapestry pictures, handcrafted lamps, paintings and even little perfectly made tables. Another day, a full box of beautifully created Christmas stockings with two hand-stitched patchwork cot quilts was handed in. With every new arrival our wonder grew. We were truly gobsmacked. The return was beyond all expectations. When we thought that we had seen it all and that the standard could not get any higher, something else would arrive to take our breath away.