Yuletide plans and memories

Hannah and I sat down to plan Christmas today. As it’s the first year of freedom from the restraints of mum, we’re both excited and want to make it a big one. Traditionally, the start of December would bring dread and foreboding as we waited for mums alcohol intake to increase even further. Christmases for us have usually meant no presents, no turkey, a carpet full of vomit and a comatose mother. Forget Father Christmas – the only fat, bearded men who turned up in our house were the drop-outs from society mum would bring home on Christmas Eve for a dirty, drunken shag beneath the mistletoe. But that’s all behind us now and we’re determined to enjoy it..
Hannah suggested we invite Sophie back for Christmas. Sophie is my eldest sister, but I may not have mentioned her much before, as we haven’t actually seen her in ages. She’s the one that used to protect me and Hannah from most of mums madness, and once I went off to university she thought it was safe to finally escape and start her own life.. Only when she had gone did we realise how much she used to do for us – both in shielding us from mums drunken stupidity, and in keeping the house going while mum escaped reality on the sofa. Last thing we heard, she was training to be a nurse in Edinburgh.
If we can re-establish contact and she comes back to visit, then I may just start to believe Christmas is A Time Of Miracles..

RC 26-11-08
1932 GMT