A Country Christmas--George Eliot

 Returning to Elizabeth David's Christmas, she reprints a passage from George Eliot's The Mill on the Floss (1860) called "A Country Christmas."

"There was the smell of hot toast and ale from the kitchen, at the breakfast hour; the favorite anthem, the green boughs, and the short sermon, gave the appropriate festal character to the church-going; and aunt and uncle Moss, with all of their seven children were looking like so many reflectors of the bright parlour fire, when the church-goers came back, stamping the snow from their feet. 

The plum-pudding was of the same handsome roundness as ever, and came in with the symbolic blue flames around it, as if it had been heroically snatched from the nether fires into which it had been thrown by dispeptic puritans; the dessert was as splendid as ever, with its golden oranges, brown nuts, and the chrystalline light and dark of apple jelly and damson cheese: in all these things Christmas was as it had always been since Tom could remember; it was only distinguished if by anything, by superior sliding and snowballs."

 The Mill on the Floss, 1860, George Eliot

Christmas at Sea

Last month I spent time reading Elizabeth David's Christmas book.  It was a mixture of memories, recipes and quotes from other authors about Christmas in their distant pasts, or while at war, as this Graham Greene passage is, part of his printed diaries from World War II.

"Christmas Day started at 11 in the morning with a bottle of champagne to cure the hangover.  Round-the-Empire broadcast and the King's rather lugubrious speech at lunch.  Dinner with a huge menu.  Hors d'oeuvre, soup, fried whiting, tinned asparagus, roast turkey and chipolatas, plum pudding, grapefruit ice.  It was like peace.  Toasts to the King, Churchill, Roosevelt (for W.) Sikorski (for the Pole), etc.  Then the captain, mate and the chief came to the smoking-room.  A shy R.N.V.R. officer tried to play hymns (the only tunes he knew), but the atmosphere by that time  was not propitious.  Played Sing, Say or Pay.  Broke up traditionally at midnight with Auld Lang Syne, and afterward I settled down to chess with the Pole. One was less homesick than one had expected.  Presumably that was the drink.  Woke up at about 5 in the morning with an explosion; I thought that one of the convoy had caught it, but it must have been the clap of the wind as we changed course."

From the author's diary of a convoy to West Africa, December 1941, Graham Greene "In Search of a Character", The Bodley Head, 1961.

When The Circle Is Broken

 

I don't remember when I started making wreaths for friends homes and the graves of family members. Certainly, some time ago.  A longstanding friend lost her husband this year.  He had gone from physically fit with regular sports activities to sitting in a recliner staring blankly into space.  Dementia.  Early onset.  Her living room was full of gifts for her family, but she hadn't decorated her house.  As she told me, "Who will be here to see it?" and now she's starting to notice that her family is moving away and involved in their own lives.  One grandchild is at Oxford. Another in Vermont.

 

 

I'm glad we did this today, because it's supposed to grow bitterly cold as soon as Thursday. My friend asked for a John Deere "Gator" ride out to the grave. It's up on a hill and far from the road. She had twisted her ankle the last time she went out there. I drove and walked the hill behind them. They were talking during the ride, and my friend learned that Pat was also from New York. Earlier, in the Visitor's Center, my friend ...solemnly turned to me and said, "I want apples on my wreath because of New York. The Big Apple." I told her that if she pre-deceased me, it would be done. I told Pat this story when they were getting out of the Gator, and she laughed and said, "She really believes in being pre-prepared, doesn't she?"

 

 

We both talked to her husband while we were standing there. I had cut some non-invasive dwarft nandina fronds from the shrub at their home, and while we were talking I was tucking these in. They had gone a rosy copper and matched everything perfectly.

 

My friend noticed the figures and said, "Oh! There are cherubs in there," and I told her "yes," for the two of them. She said, "Look, Honey. Just like when we first met. Naked all of the time."

 

 

I looked across to where her parents are buried. I glanced to the right where my parents are. I was thinking about how I used to take my parents to the Blackwater Wildlife Refuge in Cambridge, Maryland to see the geese (and snow geese) migrating from Canada. They would stop there for a few days on their Southern migration path and had done so for a long time. Now? They are in that cemetery and all over the D.C. area, including golf courses. Anywhere there are large swaths of grass.

Oddly, I didn't see one goose that day, and normally there are swarms of them.

 

The next wreath was for a family I've known since diapers.  The husband was the chief elder in the church.  The wife was my primary sunday school superintendent.  Their daughter was a dear friend (she died last year) and their son is my attorney.  The wreath is for him, and we go out to a civil war cemetery where his family is buried and take pictures, then he walks around and shows me all of his clients that have died in the past year.  That sounds like a queer thing to do, but some of the stories are over the top, as life can be.

 

 

This was a larger wreath, so more to fill in.  I had a bag of pine cones, and I admit I used liquid glitter eye shadow to fix them up on the tips.  I also had cut and dried my hydrangeas, and I shoved one in the wreath for filler.  It worked out fine.

 This bit was from one of my decorator boxes.  I was loathe to give it up, but I needed additional filler.

I won't make the mistake of using live eucalyptus again.  It's resin sticky so that when you cut it, you get black goop all over your fingers and it's hard to remove.  Dried is fine, you just don't get that lovely menthol scent.

This will probably go out to the cemetery tomorrow.  Also tomorrow--I need to finally get to me and make the wreath for my front door.  It was my mother that started with wreaths.  The tradition continues.

Tió De Nadal, or Nothing Says Christmas Like A Poop Log...If You Are In Spain

 

Tió de Nadal, a “pooping” Christmas log, is an obsession among the kids in Catalunya for a few weeks leading into the holidays.  It usually starts on December 8^th, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception.   Part of the ancient tradition of burning a Yule log in the hearth at Christmastime, these days it is a short trunk of wood propped up by two front legs, with a smile, pug nose, and floppy red felt Catalan hat called a Barretina.  Wrapped in a blanket and placed beside the fireplace.  Every night it is “fed” Clementine and potato peels until the evening of the 23^rd or 24^th of December.  Sometimes, the logs are hollowed out (via the face) and candies are put inside for future treats.  Tootsie rolls?

The tió does not drop larger objects, as those are considered to be brought by the Three Wise Men.  It does leave candies, nuts and torrons.  Depending on the region of Catalonia, it may also give out dried figs. When nothing is left to "shit", it drops a salt herring, a head of garlic, an onion, or it "urinates" by leaving a bowl of water. What comes out of the Tió is a communal rather than individual gift, shared by everyone there.

 

On that night, the family gathers around and the kids whack the log with a stick while chanting at the top of their voices, "Ca-ga-ti-o, Ca-ga-ti- o!" (Poop log!  Poop log!") and singing a short song about poopiing torro (almond and honey nougat called turron in Sapnish) and oranges instead of salted herring or charcoal.  They then reach under the blanket and find pieces of torro (and often a small present) that has been "pooped out."   

 Around Catalunya, homes resound with chanting versions of the song.  Schools have an enormous Tió that kids bring scraps from home to feed.  The offerings look like rich mounds of compost.  Sometimes Tió is whacked so vigorously that the sticks are broken and have to be replaced. 

 

To make the log defecate, one beats the tió with sticks, while singing various songs of Tió de Nadal.  There are many versions of the Tió song, but the standard one goes like this:

Cago tió   (Poop log)

Tió de Nadal   (Trunk of Christmas)

No caguis arengades   (Don’t poop herring)

Que són salades  (Which are salty)

Caga torrons   (Poop nougat)

Que són més bons   (Which are much tastier)

Caga taronges   (Poop oranges)

Que són Ben Dolces  (that are very sweet)

There are several versions of this ditty.  And if you’ve been around kids, you know how they love saying “poop.”  Another version goes:

Poop log, log of Christmas

We will put the pork in salt

The hen at the trough

And the chick on top of the pine tree

Play, play Valentine

Oxen and cows pass

Hens with shoes

And roosters with big shoes (*blink*)

Run, run children

Because the aunty is making nougat

The Vicar has tasted them

And he says they are a bit salty

Oh the donkey, oh the pig

Oh the face, face, face

Of the donkey, oh the pig

Oh the face of a pepper.

….and sometimes, for good measure they add:

Trunk of Christmas

Poop neules (a rolled wafer biscuit) and nougat

And piss champagne…”I pixa xampany!”  Don’t we all?

 

 

 

Have A Cheeky Christmas--In July

Plastic People Oh Now ~~ You're Such A Drag

Several months ago, I promised my friend Tony that I would blog today about Christmas. He had discovered this pair of twins on You Tube called The Cheeky Girls (London based-Romanian born), and he has (to quote his wife) developed "a sick fascination ." I was also told by his wife Kathy, "Don't encourage him by keeping the promise to blog about those two skanks."

About two weeks ago, I was in a Home Goods store, and they already had Halloween and Thanksgiving items out. Retailers have long been known to push the season. We've all seen Valentine's Day in October, Christmas in July.

Kathy sent along in e-mail an article written by Malio Cardarelli in which he remembers the Cerri brothers, Bill and Dick, and how one summer in 1971, Bill Cerri started playing Christmas music on the radio to break up the wilt of a D.C. summer. It became a tradition. Here is that article, as I wanted to share a piece of Washington, D.C. broadcasting history:



Beset with a number of ailments including Parkinson’s disease, Utica native Bill Cerri had planned to retire from his classical music radio show in the Washington, D.C., area in August 1990. Those plans never materialized because Cerri suffered a cerebral hemorrhage July 17 of that year while on the air and soon died — to the horror of his listeners who had followed him for the two decades his show was on WETA-FM. Cerri had an early devotion to radio and was not distracted from it for any reason, even forgoing graduation from Thomas R. Proctor Senior High School in Utica so as not to abandon his radio position at WGAT, which later became WTLB, still on the air today. There, he worked the night shift, which interfered with his required arrival time at school. When given a choice, Cerri decided to stay in radio. The budding announcer moved to Washington in 1950, perhaps as much to try a larger market as to become reunited with his high school sweetheart, Rosemarie Roey Girard (1929-2008), who was in the military service and stationed there. They eventually married and had three children before divorcing.

Cerri worked for a number of radio stations and for a time with his brother Dick Cerri, at the same station in Washington, WETA-FM, from 1970 to 1973. The older brother had the morning show called “AM” and Dick the afternoon slot, called “PM.” Much of Cerri’s early music was jazz. but eventually he embraced the classical market. One of Cerri’s most notable innovations occurred in 1971. In order to help distract listeners from the intense summer heat that prevails in the nation’s capital, Bill began playing Christmas music in the dead of summer. The concept was so well received, it was even picked up by the Air Force Band in 1975 with Cerri as master of ceremonies for the very first Air Force Band presentation of “Christmas in August.” To this day, it is still performed each summer. Cerri was to direct a presentation of his innovation by the Air Force Band in 1990, but his death in July denied him that long-anticipated opportunity. His longest lasting position, 20 years, was at WETA-FM in Washington doing classical music. On July 17, 1990, he suffered a cerebral hemorrhage and collapsed.

During this ordeal, while the WETA staff summoned emergency medical services, there were 4 minutes of dead air and scores of unanswered telephone calls from concerned listeners. Finally, WETA’s chief engineer switched to the 9 a.m. news and later announced that the host had become ill. By then, Cerri was in an ambulance, only to succumb to his illness within a few hours. After Cerri’s death, there were a number of tributes paid to him by the Washington-area media and in several memorial functions in his honor. Perhaps the most fitting might have been the memorial tribute to him at WETA-FM in which were played a number of recorded selections from Verdi’s Requiem performed by the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. Cerri’s passing left a void difficult to fill. And it all began in Utica, where his radio aspirations were cultivated. In talking about his brother’s sudden death while on the air, Dick Cerri said: “In a way I envy him; he died with his boots on.”

...and Tony? Just for you:

Have A Cheeky Christmas Time