“When you come ‘ome from school, ‘trimmins’l be up!”
“Will they, Grand-dad?”
“Aye. Yer Gran’s putting ‘em up this afternoon”.
When I got home from school, instead of finding the house festooned with those tissue paper garlands of concertina construction, all the colours of the rainbow, and more, from the most delicate pinks, salmon, lemon, lilac, to the most vibrant, flaming orange, hot red, electric blue and exotic purple (and if you had dared suggest that they were getting a bit tired after their many years of glue and sticky tape assisted service, I would have torn your leg off and stuffed the wet end down your throat- well, I might have) instead of that, I found the house choked with damp laundry.
It was the last wash-day before Christmas, and in December, by the time the washing was done, the day was too far gone for there to be any point in hanging it in the yard, even if there was no rain or smut-laden fog. So the linen line was zigzagged back and forth, across the house, ten or twelve times, on hooks permanently fixed in the picture rail for just this purpose. The lines were all now loaded with damp laundry. Until it came down (and it would take a couple of days to clear) life was lived at dwarf level.
I knew it was odd that Gran would be putting up the trimmins in the afternoon, because Betty usually did it in the evening, with my ‘help’. I don’t know how many times Charlie pulled this one on me. My first school Christmas was ’46, and we had moved by Christmas ’49, so it couldn’t have been more than three, but it seemed more.
Then when the laundry was cleared, Betty and I would put up the proper trimmins. Now in a 12ft. square room, there were a maximum of eight options. Now you have to concentrate; this is tricky. Ready? Corner to corner, along each wall- that’s four, right? And from each corner, into the centre- to the light fitting. There’s your other four. Got it? Plus, each one had to be chosen very carefully. Must be symmetrical, or it would look silly. We couldn’t just have odd ones plonked anywhere. And that’s where Mom was lucky to have my help. I was really good at deciding which ones went where. It wasn’t easy, but I was well up to the job. The Christmas tree would have to wait until the next evening.
Then the first job was to relieve the tree of all its string and brown paper wrappings, and fold them all away for eventual re-use, to protect the tree from dust through another 12 months hibernation. Then the tree was placed in the glass fruit-bowl, on the sideboard, the base being firmly wedged in with whatever came to hand- folded wodges of newspaper, balls of wool, cotton bobbins- whatever, all of which was covered with a specially preserved blanket of cotton wool snow. Then the branches would be unfolded to reveal the tree in all its natural glory, all 2’6” of it. 41
Now the lights would be put on- not the little twinkly things of today, but the big, olive-shaped lamps, at least ten, or perhaps it was even twelve to the set, and all the holders safely shrouded in electricians’ proper, trusty black tape, which really made them stand up, off the cable, as it snaked unobtrusively around the tree’s silhouette.
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| Magic |
It is because we had an artificial tree that I could fully understand Charlie’s reply when, after his brief spell in hospital (for haemorrhoids, I think) I asked him what they did to him-
“They shoved a Christmas tree up me arse, and pulled it down with the branches out!”
The tree would gradually be loaded with all the glass baubles, not just plain spherical ones, but other more intricate shapes- birds with real feathered tails, a Santa figure, a violin, a little glass trumpet which you could blow and actually get a note from because, glued into the bell-shaped end, was a single ‘tooth’ or reed from a mouth-organ, bells and glass bells with clappers of glass beads which actually struck a note, all so delicate, so fragile.
The original source had always been Bavaria, but these little treasures were unknown in England, until Mr F. W. Woolworth discovered them, before WW1, and put them in all his shops. Woolworth’s remained the best place to find them, into the 60’s when the store got streamlined. We don’t need the glass baubles now, of course; we’ve got shatterproof plastic from China.
The finishing touches would be, first, little blobs of cotton wool laid along the branches, looking exactly like snow, then a judicious and restrained application of ‘Lammetta’ which was like exceedingly thin and narrow strips of silver foil, which when draped to hang vertically, would give just enough sparkle in any light that caught it.
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| Little Gems |
Then, when all was done, and the debris tidied away, we would invite Charlie and Jane to watch while we switched on the lights. We might even switch off the main light to get the full effect. Then after our labours had been duly admired and appreciated, which might take five or even ten minutes, Betty, ever mindful of the dreaded ‘electric light bill’ would say-
“Right! Lets switch them off. We don’t want to waste them’ and the big light would go on, the tree lights off, and they would never be switched on again, save for perhaps 10 minutes on New Year’s Eve, while we sat waiting for Big Ben’s chimes, on the wireless, to ring out ‘Its New Year and bed time’
It must all sound rather naïve and sad to modern ears. Naïve, maybe, but not sad. Christmas was the most magical, exciting and wonderful time for me, and still is. I’m pleased to say my emphases have shifted, somewhat, but even now, at Christmas, I’m the biggest kid in the village. Everyone in our house on Christmas night gets
a Christmas stocking, because , as I explained years ago to my children, I worked part time for Santa, in my youth, and I still have staff membership status, stockings being one of the perks. Of course I’m obliged to leave the port bottle out for the ould feller, plus a toothful of something nice. I’ve even been known to wait up and join him in a glass. Or two.
If there are any cynics who find that too much, let me put it more simply. First, I still think the birth of the Christ Child worth celebrating, and second, having been brought up to make much of the Christmas festival, if I didn’t do so, my mother’s spirit would not be pleased.
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