Christmas and Birthdays ... something to write about ...

Angela Maria De Nobrega Freitas, BSc Hons., Open University, DipGeog., Open University - MLit., Literature, Open University, studied, MPhil., and Playwriting, studied, Birmingham University, ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ We all look forward to special events in our lives, a birthday, Christmas time. I have spent many Christmas moments/years on my own, it's okay, some of my family go abroad, to Madeira, we have responsibilities, a house which must be opened, to be aired and lived in, it's a must do trip for my family. The rest of my family live a distance away, in Southport, i live in Derbyshire, they are either working or getting through the festive period quickly so they can get back to the normal routines of life. I don't wish for Christmas to get by quickly in particular, my life is a Christmas day every day if I'm truthful, my birthdays I tend to sense more because they're very personal to me and I would prefer to share them, but usually my birthdays too I spend on my own. Once you have been through a break-up in a relationship, it's a fact of life that you will inevitably just do your own thing, and that's what I do. I do my my best, but I'm being stalked and harassed by losers, the evil that can surround better lives, i'm someone who has always attracted unwelcome attention, jealousies, pettinesses from evil individuals not educated in the niceties of life. Apart from those external confluences, I choose and appreciate my own company. However, just to explore the meaning of special occasions in our lives. The reality for most or some of us is that we do look forward to special occasions. When I was younger I sometimes did not dare think about my birthday or Christmas; I was kind of shy, very shy, and didn't really want any attention that departed from the norm. I chose to look forward to occasions quietly. My friends at school would make a fuss, bring me a card, my best friend would bring me a card and a gift - wrapped by her mum - I would prefer not to have those responsibilities placed on me - receiving a gift is a responsibility, I took it all very seriously, and we are not always in a position to offer a gift in return when the occasion arose - immediately i saw my gift I was planning in my mind the gift to return to my friend or friends. It worried me, I would talk about my worries regarding gifts to my friends with mum and she would say, we will buy something nice for this friend or that friend. To be honest, I always considered my friends were very lucky and received extremely nice gifts and hospitality from me and my family, because when they visited our home we were always very welcoming to them and our table always full to them, my mum would not hear of anyone coming to see me and going hungry or without having something nice to eat, something I found peculiarly irregular in my English friends because their parents did not seem to be so demonstratively welcoming to me and their own daughters, we would often be hungry until i left and they waited tea, sometimes my friends, usually my best friend would make toast in a hurry and a cup of tea, i kind of sensed the situation and feeling the weight of the occasion i would say, are you sure its okay we have toast, and she would say, yeah, of course it is, its just you don't seem comfortable, i would somehow manage to say, in a whisper, don't be daft, my dad will be home soon, he's alright, he likes you, and what about your mum, and she would say, my mum likes you as well, i would feel a little odd with the whole thing and put it down to the English ways of life and english peculiarities of people, so, toast and tea was fine, and she would talk in whispers about her mum and dad, and she would say her dad was always going into her room to kiss her goodnight or have her on his lap for a 'cuddle', i would say, really, is that okay with you, she was a big busted girl, and she would say, yeah, and your mum, i would say, is she okay with you cuddling your dad, yeah, she would say, i was a very intuitive child and teenager as I am as an adult, i talked about those things with my mum, we felt it was odd, mum said to talk about it with my friend in a way not to make her feel uncomfortable and my friend always broached the subject with me; these experiences with my best friend or other friends would open an important channel of communication for me and my mum as I grew up and developed as a young woman about each other's relationships in family life, which I felt became important to discuss as I observed my friends' lives. As I was saying about friends and gifts, after talking about things with mum I would feel a little better, but the weight of receiving my gifts weighed upon me and worried me continually. I guess you could say I was a little bit of a worrier; but, apart from my worries, as a person growing up, i was okay. Inevitably, it's true to say, my gifts to friends were always better than the gifts I received, and, unhappilly, that has always been the case; to a point.  The gifts I received from my family and my boyfriends have always been outstanding, and if I believe the thought is special to a gift it means more than anything priceless, and that's the way it should be. My first boyfriend telling me he loved me was a gift, my second boyfriend proposing to me was a gift. My mum coming home from hospital alive and well and free of cancer was a gift, just as the news my dad had died in an accident was a terrible gift, and so on, you get the picture. All intruders, leave my website now, I don't want you here, I can assure you. My family gave me special gifts, when I was growing up, I was given a microscope from my god-son-adopted uncle, he was thirty-five years older than me and my auntie's common law husband; a typewriter from my mum; a baby blue boy doll with blue hair from my older brother which in recent times, sadly, I gave away to Oxfam, a made and created card with heartfelt poem from my little brother, from my older brother as well, and a promise between me and my little brother we would watch the same programmes on television without falling out over what, that was a big deal. We had to be friends, my little brother and I because we spent so much of our spare time together; my friends loved him, his curls, they loved touching his golden curls and they would say, oh, come on, Ange, bring Virgilio, if we were going somewhere - we would look at each other, his impish little smile, and I would say, okay - but we all have to look after him, not just me - agreed. And so it went. My older brother I hardly saw because he worked, or he was at college, or, a lot of the time, with his girlfriend of the moment; and he had one or two of those. They were always revelations to me, not really what I would consider at home kind of girls, they were perfectly happy to cozy up with my brother in his room upstairs while the family were downstairs, that to me was a big no, no, that to me said it all, not my kind of girls, lets say, I wouldn't dream of doing such a thing, they were as different from me as it was possible to be and I didn't think they were the kind of girls who would make my brother happy, they only lived for the moment and i felt they didn't see my brother in terms of the long term, so for me, I did not have any respect for them; respect for me, my mum, yes, if they had observed that, then okay we could have overlooked their less than desirable qualities, but no respect or consideration to me or my mum in that way spelt the end of them with my brother, not because of anything we said, we wanted my brother to be happy, but he got hurt a few times and we were not surprised with that. I considered them in the main, older, more sophisticated; worldly somehow, which to me meant careless and out for what they could get from my brother, I wasn't really friends with them, nor they with me, they were okay with me, they liked me, but they knew we were as different from one and the other as it was possible to be. I've never regarded lax attitudes as a good recipe for anyone's girlfriend, much less a fiance or wife, no. I was different. Even my little brother as he grew up would bring girls home, they were always so precious, kind of spoilt or posh - one girlfriend I remember had a place at Cambridge University - she was ooming and auhing, didn't want to leave my brother for University she knew would change her life - her parents asked Virgilio if he would talk with her and encourage her to go to Cambridge and he did; I remember she came over to our house and I was reading Vogue and I thought, gosh, that was her, that was the kind of person I was reading about - manners and affection and love were all I asked for my brother and she had and was all that - she went to Cambridge and that was that. They kept in touch, but both their lives took different paths, and different directions. We see those changes In our lives and we learn from those experiences. I remember some of the posh girls my brothers would introduce me to, my brothers would say embarrassing things like, this is my sister, the clever one of the family - or, this is my sister, the model in our family, or this is my sister, the sensible one, or this is my sister, the posh one out of all of us - such things. When it was my turn, I would say, these are my brothers, my mum, Keith, my mum's boyfriend, everyone would be happy and there was always a happy party kind of atmosphere as they welcomed a new member to our family - my first boyfriend Simon, then my second boyfriend Kenny. To continue ... Angela Maria De Nobrega Freitas