come all ye..

i am in my house, with tree and lights, and winter pimms.

there are people from our little road outside in the turning area, gathered in coats and hats singing carols and being merry together.

people keep asking me how i am, or how i think i am going to be, over these coming days.

he was going to be here you see, this christmas. the kids were due to be with their mother for christmas this year so he wanted to come here.

as you know, if you have been around these pages for any length of time, or been around me during this time of year, i love christmas the most. i love the detail of it, the routine and the surprise of it, the grandeur and luxuriousness of it, the music and smells of it.

and this year so far has held many of its usual charms. the sensory delights, the present-wrapping (i love that part..) and the figuring out how well you really do know your family in order that your present may be a joy to them and not just something else to find room in the house for....

what i have realised this evening is that being on my own or undistracted or unoccupied at this particular christmas season is probably not going to be the best thing. the silence is deafening.

i had a dream about him last night. probably only the second that i have had since 15/7....and to wake from it was, well, it was like losing him all over again.

this should now be qualified by saying that he was a GRUMP about christmas and drove me mad last year with his lack of enthusiasm for my favourite holiday....