Christmas lunch preparations in hand, Mr Gant and I took Dog for a pre-lunch walk to the village.  En route, my brother appeared.  ‘Just going for a quick drink before lunch.  Come along, I’ll have a round ready for you”, he said cheerily.   Realising that if we wanted a conversation with him this Christmas, it was now or never, so we agreed.  Not that we needed much persuasion. I have never been in a pub on Christmas Day and was curious.

There were only five other people in the pub when we entered, a bemused Dog in tow.  Minutes later, the door burst open and streams of people came in.  And three other dogs, one of which was nattily dressed in a green and red felt Christmas waistcoat.  (Sadly, his matching hat with a bell had been stolen by another dog and buried in a manure heap.)  The pub was soon full to bursting point.

I have always wondered why anyone would even want to go to the pub on Christmas Day (apart from wanting to speak to their brother, that is).   Well, now I know.  Some of them were villagers who didn’t normally visit the pub but were evidently keen to find a distraction from their families and visitors.   But most people had been there the evening before and wanted to collect an endurance award for being capable of coming back the next day.   All were eager to relive or learn about the gossip and highlights of the evening before: how old Alf, who had restricted his alcohol intake to a half pint of bitter each night for the last twenty years, had been given a glass of whisky or two and then made a spectacle of himself, how Dave had got a bit too familiar with someone’s wife and had his face slapped, how someone else had keeled over the minute they had stepped into the fresh air.  And, most memorable of all apparently, Ann's 'poledance'.

Most seemed to know each other well and everyone knew my brother.  So I felt a bit poignant when I realised that I only recognised one other person in the pub.  Because this was the village I grew up in from the age of seven before leaving home to go to college .   At one point I knew everyone in the village.  .  I mentioned this to my brother.  He was astonished.   “Surely you remember D. over there” he said.  “And that’s S.  And over there in the corner is S. and P. – you used to go with them to the disco until you were seventeen”.

And to my absolute horror, I realised he was right.  Some of these grey, middle-aged people were my old school pals.  My memory of them dates from thirty years ago.  And in my mind, when I return home as a daughter and sister, we are all still teenagers. And as they didn’t appear to recognise me either, what did that say about my appearance?   It was like being introduced to your very own instantly-ageing process.    

There was only one thing to be done.  I made a mental note to book a hairdresser’s appointment and a facial after Christmas and then had a second glass of wine.  There’s nothing like going back home late for Christmas lunch and having to face an irate mother to make you feel young again.