Ghosts of Christmases Past
After my third (or was it my fourth?) glass of scotch, I tossed the few holiday cards I received into the bin. The pro forma exercise seemed tiresome and hypocritical to me. What did I really have in common with them anymore, with their wives and children, mortgages, school fees, the pony club &c.? Not a damned thing, truthfully.
That was the last of the Macallan. I thought I had another bottle, or part of one, stashed somewhere, and looked until I found it in the back of the cupboard, half-filled and covered with a fine sheen of dust. Laphroaig. It figured. How appropriate.
Ethan and I both jeered at the holiday season, but we celebrated it nonetheless, in our own fashion. It was the only time of the year, apart from my birthday, when Ethan felt he could give me anything and not make me feel self-conscious about it. He was wrong. I did feel self-conscious about it, but less so, perhaps, than I might have done otherwise.
When they were both still alive, Ethan's parents often sought sunnier climes during the winter, and so it was that our first two years together we went to his home, at least from Christmas eve until Epiphany. Getting out of the City for a while just then was a present in itself. When his parents weren't at home, Ethan was content during our occasional sojourns to the country. I don't know that I ever felt entirely comfortable.
I was impressed, certainly, perhaps even awed at first, but always more than a little subdued whenever we visited "the ancestral pile" as Ethan derogatorily referred to the place where he grew up. We both "dropped class" in the City -- it was a fashionable thing to do, then, especially among those of us who prided ourselves on sneering at those who followed fashion -- but a visit to Ethan's house drove home to me as few things ever could the disparity of our circumstances.
As the son, grandson, great-grandson &c &c of Watchers, I was accustomed to old things, but was always taught to treat them with respect, and keep them more or less as pristine as I could. What shocked me to the bone, initially, was the utterly cavalier attitude Ethan had toward things which, under different circumstances, might well be considered museum pieces, or part of the national heritage (and there's no irony whatsoever in my assessment, I assure you).
I felt more than a little like Charles Ryder visiting Brideshead for the first time.
That was the last of the Macallan. I thought I had another bottle, or part of one, stashed somewhere, and looked until I found it in the back of the cupboard, half-filled and covered with a fine sheen of dust. Laphroaig. It figured. How appropriate.
Ethan and I both jeered at the holiday season, but we celebrated it nonetheless, in our own fashion. It was the only time of the year, apart from my birthday, when Ethan felt he could give me anything and not make me feel self-conscious about it. He was wrong. I did feel self-conscious about it, but less so, perhaps, than I might have done otherwise.
When they were both still alive, Ethan's parents often sought sunnier climes during the winter, and so it was that our first two years together we went to his home, at least from Christmas eve until Epiphany. Getting out of the City for a while just then was a present in itself. When his parents weren't at home, Ethan was content during our occasional sojourns to the country. I don't know that I ever felt entirely comfortable.
I was impressed, certainly, perhaps even awed at first, but always more than a little subdued whenever we visited "the ancestral pile" as Ethan derogatorily referred to the place where he grew up. We both "dropped class" in the City -- it was a fashionable thing to do, then, especially among those of us who prided ourselves on sneering at those who followed fashion -- but a visit to Ethan's house drove home to me as few things ever could the disparity of our circumstances.
As the son, grandson, great-grandson &c &c of Watchers, I was accustomed to old things, but was always taught to treat them with respect, and keep them more or less as pristine as I could. What shocked me to the bone, initially, was the utterly cavalier attitude Ethan had toward things which, under different circumstances, might well be considered museum pieces, or part of the national heritage (and there's no irony whatsoever in my assessment, I assure you).
I felt more than a little like Charles Ryder visiting Brideshead for the first time.