Comfort and Joy Read Free

nothing, nada, zero, to complain about.
     But I felt – jealous isn’t quite the right word. I didn’t want more or better stuff. Envious, then. Envious of my
sisters’ fat, teddy-stuffed stockings and everything they symbolized: their childhood, with two parents who were their parents,
     two parents who loved each other living under the same roof; the ordinariness of the teddies and little games; the absolute
     safe, cosy, family-ness of it.
    And now, oddly – or not oddly at all, depending on your viewpoint – my own children are in the same situation, with a stepfather,
     and a much younger sibling (just the one) who lives, utterly secure, at home with a mummy and daddy under one roof; a sibling
     whose fat, teddy-stuffed stocking may present an emotional contrast that kind of harshes their Christmas morning mellow. Or
     not. They’re happier than I was by miles, but still – I’m taking no chances. I hurtle down a floor, to the HMV concession,
     to stock up on Xbox games.
    It all gets done, eventually. It always does – I don’t know why I get myself in such a flap. Unless I’ve miscalculated, I’ve
     now got presents for everybody – enough presents, good presents, the gifts that will bring joy to the family home and would
     cause the Baby Jesus to kick His legs and coo with pleasure if His crib were in our kitchen. I take out my tattered list and
     double-check: yes, all done, though I’m not sure about the fluorescent underpants for Jake, which seemed a good – well, a
     comical – idea at the time. Still, too late now. I’ll do a last-minute supermarket dash tomorrow – this might finally be the
     year that we don’t run out of bay leaves – and try to get the bulk of the wrapping done tonight after dinner. I’m laughing,
     basically. All that fuss, and here I am, sorted, good to go, like some marvellous housewife in a magazine. Things are looking
     up.
    The crowds have thinned out a bit – it’s just before 6 p.m. – and even the pigeons no longer seem that keen to walk alongside
     me. Maisy’s at home with her granny, Sam’s mum – mine doesn’t do babysitting – who said earlier she’d actively
like to look after her and put her to bed. ‘Take as long as you like, love. It’s what I’m here for,’ she said, in her martyred
     but kind way. I have time – ample time – for a coffee and a sit-down.
    It suddenly occurs to me that I can probably do better than that. I don’t really want to donkey my parcels and bags around
     in the rain only to squeeze myself into an overcrowded, overheated coffee shop, and besides they start shutting at about this
     time. A light bulb goes on up above my head: I could go and have a drink somewhere really nice. Somewhere I could leave my
     parcels with a matronly guardian, and where someone would take my coat and bring me, I don’t know, a giant Martini. And some
     olives. And some nuts. Maybe those little Parmesan biscuit things. Because actually I’m starving. Yes. Who does those things?
     Who cocoons you in that way? Why, a hotel. I’ve perked up massively by now: under the giant wet hood of my Arctic parka, I
     am smiling in the rain. I’m going to take myself to a glamorous hotel, for a pre-Christmas drink by myself. How festive is
     that? Just the one drink (don’t want to spend a fortune), and then home within a couple of hours tops, in time to cook supper.
    If I’m going to do this, I might as well do it properly. I don’t want to sit in the bar of a sad hotel, with sad men from
     out of town who’ve come to London to see their children before heading off again to spend Christmas all by their lonely, divorced,
     broken selves. This leads me to quickly count my blessings, an old hobby that I’ve never quite managed to give up. Chief among
     them, tonight: I am not a sad man whose ex-wife only lets him see his children for a couple of hours on 23 December, while
     she sits silently in a corner, bristling with resentment and old