10.15am: I’m thrilled that I’ve slept ten hours and happily make my get-the-day-on tea. I’ve no mini Christmas tree this year but I have brought the outside in with a wreath I made in a workshop at St Peter’s, Belsize Square. Three presents are waiting on my new 40x40cm coffee table – an unexpected gift found in perfect condition by the building’s bins yesterday. I unwrap a box of heavenly scented candles from my Godkids (phew! not more chocs,) an online ordered Greenpeace t-shirt (jubilations the size is right,) and a pair of festive socks which I decided to re-gift from me to me when I was wrapping the tombola prizes for the magazine’s recent all-of-Belsize-welcome Christmas party.
10.32am: Even when you don’t have Christmas plans, there needs to be a plan. I get out the clay from my art cupboard and make a couple of plant pots, whilst listening to Radio X. Admittedly, I did blip on Christmas Eve with a non-clinical panic that perhaps I should have made more effort to secure a place at a table with people on Christmas Day. Then I remembered what Dr Martha Beck said on a podcast chat – creativity is the antidote to anxiety. I immediately threaded a needle and sewed a patch on a little jute bag and all was calm and bright again.
12.11am: Smoked salmon, cream cheese, a boiled egg drizzled with balsamic glaze, cucumbers and dill on toasted focaccia seems an appropriate high holy breakfast. I also have a chunk of panettone which luckily was gifted to me in cellophane so I don’t have to agonise over whether I need another pretty tin. I realise that the hardest part of being alone is reacting to the presents that need sharing like a bottle of red and a box of assorted Lindt balls. I managed to give half the panettone to a friend who invited me over for scrabble a few days after I received it, but I had to eat so much leftover cheese after the magazine’s Christmas party, that I came dangerously close to falling out with cream cheese.
12.42: I may have nowhere to go but I want to get dressed up on a day when I don’t need to bike anywhere or lug magazines to the shops. I put on a dress which looks swell with my new t-shirt over it. As usual go to Belsize Village for a cappuccino. Roni’s is open and it feels good to see all the other people who are not sitting around a tree in matching pyjamas.
Early Afternoon: Even on this once-a-year day I’m reluctant to start watching stuff on screen until after five. Of course, my phone is never far. I enjoy a few text wishes which I wasn’t expecting and am relieved that none of my Insta tribe have posted anything to make me feel like I’m missing out. I settle with the book which I bought on Christmas Eve at a very busy Hampstead Waterstones; how heart warming it was to see so many people buying books! (Turns out that Fern Brady’s autobiographical Strong Female Character is ‘gripping’ enough to take to my local Italian – Caldesi – where I briefly sit at the bar and experience the wonder of an expertly made, premium cocktail on Boxing Day evening. Godfather, I’ll be back.)
4.32pm: My backup plan for this unique day was to bike around central London and photograph winter lights, but I don’t feel like going out. Besides time to light the first Hanukkah candle. How marvellous that the Jewish holiday of hope has coincided with Christmas. I make a prayer for myself, my loved ones, those forced to be in a war, and eight hostages whose faces and names are on little cards leaning against a box on the lounge table.
4.48pm: Although I love cooking and can happily do it from scratch all year round, I’m gifting myself time out from washing up. I pour a delicious readymade tomato sauce straight into the pot where I boiled the spaghetti, so I only have to wash the pot, drainer, plate and fork. Eating at a time which is neither lunch nor supper (sunch? lupper?) is a spontaneity win for me. I perch at the kitchen high counter with my iPad on and couldn’t ask for better company than those Bad Sisters.
5.35pm: I meant to watch That Christmas today but saw it already. (Curtis scores again!) Netflix suggests The Holiday but sensitive to my status, I’m avoiding rom-coms; although I could be tempted to re-watch Love Hard and a Gavin and Stacey final episode is on its way. Whilst gluing high-end tissue paper on a canvas I opt for the ever so cathartic Apple+ documentary ‘Twas the Fight Before Christmas. I can’t resist criticising in voce forte America’s greatest Christmas light installer who happens to be a narcissistic, gas lighting, hypocritical, revengeful bully.
08.30pm: I go to my phone to see what gifts the shepherds, kings and queens of BBC Radio 4 brought to today. One hour of Jo Brand and another Frank Skinner show – ta very much! I also hear the King’s message and find it moving. With the hefty emphasis on Christmas as a time for families and gatherings (and rightly so because it all began with a mother giving birth,) I’m glad to be reminded of key people who are having an ordinary work day.
11.04pm: In the spirit of festive indulgence, I go to bed a little later than usual. As I plug in the phone charger, I congratulate myself for not having looked back in sorrow at memorable past Christmases when I was surrounded by love, laughter and kids taking charge, and, not looking forward to the daunting near-empty days ahead when locals will likely still be offline and business slow. Instead I think how there’s a good reason we call the moment by moment, here and now way of living – the present.
