tradition

Christmas: We’re all doing it wrong

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Christmas - We're all doing it wrongMost people believe that their way of celebrating Christmas is the best. And they’re right.

Christmas is so rooted in tradition – from the hour at which you open your presents, to the length of time you’re expected to wear your paper hat – that it can be hard to believe that other people might do it differently.

Ask a person how they spend Christmas day – the booze fuelled games of Pictionary, the collective afternoon nap – and notice that no matter what they say, you remain silently sure that you and your troupe are still the Kings and Queens of Christmas.

Allow me to demonstrate. I’ll tell you how I spend Christmas day and, as you read, notice how each sentence makes you more and more confident that your way is better. Don’t worry, I won’t be offended.

1. Stockings
These are opened between 9 and 10am in our house (after a quick reminder from mum that “If we don’t get up now, it won’t be worth bothering!”). Our stockings are made up of a combination of items that mum has purchased in the January sales. She’s no fool our mum, she knows that if she’s going to fill a giant sock with items that are actually worth having without having to remortgage the house, she’s going to have to think outside the yuletide box. There is something heart-warming about revealing a bottle of mango flavour body lotion or a box of notelets shaped like a disco ball that you know have been in your mum’s cupboard for a full eleven months on Christmas morning.

2. Arguments
We like to have at least two arguments on Christmas day. They don’t last long, but Christmas isn’t Christmas without some kind of momentary rage, though the contents of our moans have changed as we’ve grown up. Whereas previously we’d start the day with: “Muuum! Nick won’t get up for stockiiings! Will you tell him?! HE’S RUINING MY DAY!” Now it’s: “Charlotte, stop putting make-up on your haggard face and come down for presents, you NOB.” As we have matured, so too have our fights.

3. Food
For some reason we are always running late on Christmas day. Breakfast is therefore not the smoked salmon and bucks fizz extravaganza that Marks and Spencer suggests it should be, but a panicked guzzling of toast or half-cooked boiled eggs before clearing the kitchen so that mum can make a start on “that bastard turkey”. The lunch itself is always very nice, though eaten to the soundtrack of my mum swearing that next year we’re just having frozen lasagne and declaring that we can “just sort ourselves out” for the rest of the day. This is fine by us as it means we can get away with eating more Pringles, cheese and Cadbury’s Miniature Heroes than we’d ever be allowed the rest of the year.

4. Presents
Since the days of waking up at 4 o’clock in the morning on Christmas day, desperate to open all our gifts at once are now far behind us (if I do wake up at that time it’s because I need the toilet or have forgotten to wrap something), we are now able to wait until after lunch to open our gifts. My younger brother doles them out, adding an element of danger to proceedings by reading each label and then hurling the gift at the recipient. The prize for catching yours first time is the respect of the family and a fully intact present.

5. The Quiz
Always a bright boy, my younger brother noticed at an early age that Christmas day evening can be extremely dull. With no more presents to look forward to, or crackers to be pulled, it’s only the promise of a cold meat sandwich that keeps us from our beds. And so, his annual quiz was born. This event has grown from a list of general knowledge questions he wrote at the age of 12, to a two-hour, multimedia spectacular that the now 24-year-old spends three days preparing in the interest of our festive amusement. It’s got a film round, a music round and an intimidating ‘individual questions’ round, and sees us battle into the late hours until my team inevitably wins. No need for a telly in our house, we’ve got the sound of family members shouting “Cheat!” and “But I couldn’t see the screen because Charlotte’s massive head was in the way!” to keep us entertained until bedtime.

Best day ever, right!

No? Still prefer your way? I thought you might say that.

Let’s just agree to disagree.

Marriage: Why I’m changing my name

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IMG_1226I’ve decided to change my name when we’re married.

Not Charlotte – I’ll stick with that for at least a little bit longer (Nothing Good Rhymes With Petula would be a terrible name for a blog) – just my surname for now.

With the guest list a close, migraine inducing second, this has been the hardest decision on the marriage planning list. Yes, it was tricky choosing which heel would look most profound with my dress, and which flowers would best complement the venue’s exquisite wooden beams, but deciding how my post would be addressed for the rest of my life has been a little more taxing.

I have changed my mind more times than I do when looking at a restaurant menu. Sticking with Reeve is the equivalent of ordering a nice safe steak – familiar, medium rare, and only likely to cause problems if spelt with an ‘s’ on the end (I can no more stomach two steaks than I can being referred to as ‘Reeves’). Whereas changing to my new, married name is like selecting a Bouillabaisse. Sure, I know how to spell it (thanks to Google) but I’ve not grown up with it. Will I still look and feel like me when I’ve got it?

The only way to make this kind of decision is by listing the pros and cons of each option. To be Mrs B or not to be Mrs B – that is the question:

Reasons TO change

1. A post wedding project
The wedding is over, the honeymoon is complete, the gifts are all unwrapped and the cards are gathering dust – what the hell do I do with myself next? Bake a quiche and enjoy marital bliss? Take the Volvo I imagine will automatically appear on the drive as soon as we say ‘I do’ for a spin?

Changing my name will give me a nice meaty project to get my teeth into. I will have to ring everyone – the mortgage people, the council tax people, the trillion companies behind all the shop clubcards that prevent my purse from shutting… I’ll have a whale of a time. And I’m sure they’ll all want to hear how the wedding went too.

2. Bye bye school
When I was at school, I’d have liked some time off being Charlotte Reeve. She was deeply uncool (conjugating French verbs was one of her hobbies) and pleased if she just managed to get through the day without anyone laughing directly in her face.

So changing my name can be the final stage in shaking off my teenage years and rebranding as the new, super trendy, adult Charlotte, free to conjugate without judgment. Oui, elle peut.

3. They will never find me
Hey, people I grew up with! You know how you think it’s hilarious to find pictures from when we were kids with bad hair and ocean sized eyebrows, and upload them to Facebook and tag me in them? Well, if I change my name then you’re going to have to work a lot harder to find me, and I’ll have an excuse to just point blank deny that the fruit bowl-haircutted creature in the photo is me. If only they’d invent a ‘I hope your scanner explodes’ button…

Reasons NOT to change

1. Admin
While some people might call the process of changing your name a ‘project’, others would deem it an administrative nightmare. Changing my name means calling every mug with the keys to my money, my right to travel, and the ability to give me points in exchange for the use of my own shopping bag, and then waiting by the letter box in the hope that an avalanche of newly printed plastic arrives. For someone who hates being on hold as much as I do, sticking with Reeve would be a wise decision.

2. A comedy of errors
I have had some phenomenal variations of my surname over the years: ‘Charlotte Rave’, ‘Mr Charlotte Greeve’ and my most recent favourite ‘The Charlotte Reeve’ show that even the simplest name can send a mailing system wild. I have put so much energy into getting people to understand that my name is Reeve not Reed, Breathe or Steve that I’m not sure I can take another one on.

3. Sorry, are you talking to me?
Deciding to be referred to as Mrs is one thing, but remembering to answer to it is another. I can just imagine: My name will be shouted into the dentist waiting room, or over the tannoy at the supermarket ham counter, and I’ll be looking around gormlessly for its owner to come forward before catching a glimpse of my new Clubcard and realising it’s me. Remembering to respond when called will be just another thing to add to my ‘To do’ list.

It’s a tough one to call.

And I’ve really battled with it. The main reason I thought I’d stick with my maiden name is because I worried that changing wasn’t a very feminist thing to do. Surely we can just be called whatever we like and still be married? I could change my name to Forrest Gump and still be his wife ’til death do us part if I wanted, couldn’t I? (Though I fear getting through passport control could be a struggle.)

And that’s quite right. But, in my case, that is precisely why I am changing. Because I want to and, as a wise friend gently reminded me, feminism is about women deciding what happens to them so I won’t be kicked out of the club just yet.

And anyway, I think it’s worth changing, if only for the anecdotes I’ll gather during the process. If my experience as a Reeve is anything to go by, I’ve got some interesting post coming my way.