Santa is Knackered


 This is Dave Smith at the Trelawnyd Christmas Fair yesterday, he’s a good egg and always up to play Santa every year . It was obviously hard work as he dropped off halfway through the festivities, one I missed again by being on nights.



Lunch on nights


Night staff, we had out own Christmas Lunch and bloody lovely it was too 
 

The Holy Frijoles


On nights tonight, and as three staff are covering all of the others on the ward Christmas do we are having a shared Christmas meal Takaway in our break.
My Holy Frijoles nativity arrived yesterday which is useless but great fun.
There are nine figures, the same as my own family of stone people I made in pottery




I will leave you with this festive piece of Wicked
 

Gifts


 I’ve taken the day off from acting as counsellor today to regroup, recharge and re boot my Christmas December Jobs. 
The kitchen tops are filled with village gifts, wrapping paper and the like. Novelty tinned biscuits for Sailor John and Many ,a put together hamper for Trendy Carol and her hubby, a small something for Animal helper Pat, Christmas Decorations for the Randa girls ( Randa almost women!) bulb flowers for the velvet voiced Linda .
It’s nice to have ticked the box
Ive posted my Christmas cards too ! ( Bloody thirty pounds of postage! ….I swore in the post office) 

The kittens are in the living room watching reruns of The Walking Dead
The zombies seem to fascinate them
Soon I will be hanging the cards that came today. 


Counselling Day

 My personal counsellor is an eighty year old Irish Woman. She dresses in mountains of shawls, all pinned together at her shoulder by a large Scottish broach. She has dyed black hair which suits her and she uses her direct, compassionate stare to lethal effect when she needs to.

We meet regularly in a little market town in rural North Wales

For weeks she has walked beside me as I’ve analysed patterns of behaviour and emotion and has sat there all accepting  and empathetic when I’ve shared things no one else will ever know, or ever know on this earth.

To me she is a kind of Yoda crossed by Guinan and Ordinary People’s Dr Berger 
A quiet soul who has seen it all.
This was our last consultation until January and darkness had already fallen as we sat there .

After we ended today she held out a thin arm and we shook hands, her grip surprisingly strong
“ Happy Christmas” she said with feeling 

Her spectacles shining in the lights of her period Christmas tree, 
Which Sat cheerfully in the corner of her consulting room .


Ponies

 The ponies from the riding stables had broken out into Rhodfa Arthur just after dark tonight and an array of residents and riders blocked their escape onto the main road  by marshalling drivers to park their cars over the T junction .
The three ponies were spooked and unpredictable but eventually were herded rather spookily down the lane , past my cottage to their field past Trendy Carol’s house.
Good humour and relief was much evident in the air.
I love moments like these where people join together without thinking 
We need more of them 

Pineapple Chunks


 Ive finished the last of my Christmas cards this afternoon, and my mind wandered over a coffee at the kitchen table. 

I noted that I’d not sent my ex mother in law a Christmas card since my separation. I had not wanted to. Within a day she had cut me from her life without even a text and that had stung, and wounded me greatly.
But that was five years ago now and I was led by Going Gently to happier times

My memories wandered to a conversation on Broadstairs beach  
Sometime almost two decades ago

    “ The Prof's family have a beach hut on Broadstairs beach. They have had one for a couple of generations. Apparently you " stake" your beach area with judicial usage of chairs, wind breaks and an assortment of plastic furniture so that no member of the general public ventures within a gnat's crotchet of your encampment.....Think the settlement of Alexandria in The Walking Dead and you will get my gist......
The Prof made himself comfortable as Sorrel and I had a chat about nothing....these "nothing"conversations drive him to distraction.......which makes them even more entertaining.
Sorrel " I love slices mango and melon"
John: " Do you?........I am a bit partial to pineapple chunks myself"
Sorrel: " Really?"
The Prof " harrumphs" at this point.
John " yes......especially tinned pineapples"
Sorrel" thats strange, I would have thought you'd go for fresh

Brief silence

Sorrel: " Do you like raspberries John?"
John " I've gone off them a bit "
Sorrel " hum"
John:" they are a bit bland, the ones from the supermarket"

Sorrel " What about strawberries?"
The Prof then sighs very loudly and shifts in his deck chair
John" Oh I love stawberries ! ........"
Sorrel " I love them too"
Prof ( under his breath ) " oh For fuck's sake"

Long silence

Sorrel " John......what Are your thoughts on passion fruit?"
The Prof screaming into the wind " OH MY GOD........I WAS ADOPTED!!!!!!"

I smiled at the memory 
And on impulse wrote her a Christmas Card