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My dear friend

I hope this email finds you; by which I mean nothing more or less than that it finds you. What more can we hope for in these strange days?

Tracey Thorn spells her own name incorrectly. But then, that’s probably her parents’ fault more than hers. And anyway, I will forgive her anything, for Joy is surely the most perfect Christmas song ever written.

I am staying in my own house for Christmas this year. It’s the only Christmas Day I’ve ever spent in this house except in 2021 when we were in COVID isolation. My youngest boy was even deeper in isolation and had to stay in his bedroom. Don’t feel too sorry for him—he gleefully sent texts asking for another serve of pavlova. We had eight pavlovas between the four of us because I’d finished prepping the pavlovas the day before we became isolationists. All of this is a long-winded way of saying that I’m extremely happy to be in my own house. However, I’ll miss the opportunity to play the most perfect roadtrip song ever written.

If you are looking for something to read over these coming weeks, you could do worse than look through this incredible list from one of my incredibly well-read friends, Jo Case. It landed in my inbox just before I started writing to you, so I’ve only skimmed it, but will be getting back to it toot sweet.

I know that I have sent you a variation of what is to follow before, but I wanted to send a small extract from my world-famous, live Christmas letter reading. Not to pretend that all is calm and all is bright, because all most certainly is not. But as a moment of respite, an opportunity to remind myself that hope is our spark and friendship is our fuel.

You know how much I love Charles Dickens and this year, as I face the prospect of an empty nest, the sentiment of my favourite Dickens story beckons. In ‘What Christmas is as we grow older’ Dickens recalls an ideal childhood Christmas; but we know that Dickens’ childhood was difficult; and we also know that the year he wrote that story was the year his daughter Dora died. So, while ‘What Christmas is as we Grow Older’ seems to invite nostalgia, we know that the nostalgia is for a time that isn’t real. I think Dickens is saying, don’t pretend there was, there is, or there will be some perfect Christmas; but never lose your capacity for hope and for wonder.

Dickens also says we should remember the dead at this time more than at any other and that we should think of our other losses too—our failures and abandoned plans, relationships gone wrong. He writes: ‘…as we grow older, let us be more thankful that the circle of our Christmas associations and of the lessons that they bring, expands! Let us welcome every one of them, and summon them to take their places round the Christmas fire, where what is sits open-hearted.”

This year, I will do as I have done so many years before, and on Christmas Eve, find a quiet time to light a candle. I strike the match in the name of absent friends. I close my eyes, I take a breath, allow my thoughts to focus and to wander. In only that short space of time, I will feel everyone who has loved me, who I have loved, appear. The list of absent friends grows longer every year. There is not only death; there is geography and distance; there is the truth that sometimes friendships soften.

All are absent, all are distant, but in this moment, none are faded. I see each one who’s there. I feel their singular, their collective strength. There is sadness in their absence. I won’t pretend there’s not. But in the moment when I close my eyes and take a breath and think of them? They bring their love to me, and I send mine to them. 

My dear friend, thank you for once again receiving my letter in the spirit in which it is shared, a moment of friendship in an uncertain world. I write with the knowledge that we agree on many things, but not all; that our friendship is flawed because we ourselves are flawed; and that through hard-won lessons we know that two things can be true—that life is hard, and life is beautiful too.

Until next time, I will think of you often and with love. Have a gentle Christmas my dear friend; a gentle Christmas, and a peace-filled New Year.

Your friend,

Tracy x

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