My girls have been put to bed and the house is silent, warm and peaceful. So this feels like a good time to resume my blog and finish off the BNJ before the Christmas whisky buy-in. I’m reduced to a couple of half bottles and a few dregs that demand consumption before I restock my whisky larder for the big day.
This year will be a milestone Christmas because for the first time in my life I won’t be spending it around my mums. They’ll be an empty chair in the house I grew up in and I’ll be running around my own, cooking Christmas dinner. I’m quite looking forward to it. I’m looking forward to Christmas morning around the tree with the Girlf and the kids, watching them open their presents. I’m looking forward to their excitement. Christmas doesn’t feel like Christmas without kids. For the last few years I’ve opened my gifts after finishing work. I’ve ripped open my meager presents at five in the morning before heading home to sleep off the nights stresses.
This year I’ll be woken up by children, probably far too early, rather than falling out of bed in my own time to head into town for lunch. This year I’ll be dad. I’ll be carving.
This particular Noel will be celebratory. The Girlf is finally a published author. The Christmas Fae has made it into a romantic festive anthology and at last she’ll be getting paid for her art. She’s beside herself with glee. Like a child she has spent the last few days skipping around the house in haze of joyful smugness. I take a little credit for this myself as I was the one who persuaded her to give romantic fiction a go. The young adult stuff was going nowhere and if she's honest she’d admit her self she never built up much momentum on any of her projects.
The banister outside the upstairs bathroom is waist high with Mills and Boons. She devours them in one sitting so my man logic surmised that maybe this was her true calling. She relented and now she is published… in e book format. I’m very happy for her but regretfully I’m unlikely to see a percentage. She’ll just support me when she’s a zillionaire.
The tree is supported by a healthy pile of presents. I’m very impressed by how quickly I’ve done all my shopping! God bless Amazon. Seriously though, aside for a few bits and bobs I’m done. Here we are in the first week of December and I’ve only got a couple of things left to buy. Being in a relationship feminizes you. You get all your Christmas shopping done early, you cook more, you wash up more often and you sleep in a very gay bed. Every night I crawl under a flowery duvet.
The mighty do indeed eventually fall. You start out full of testosterone answering to no one, you are master of your own destiny. Then before you know it you’re falling asleep in front of property shows in your dad chair next to a pink wall. You start to get that resigned look in your eyes, broken, guilted into being reasonable and bearing other peoples feelings in mind. The inner caveman growls his indignation.
However I’m still master of my own house. After all, if it weren’t for me they’d starve to death. How many months of crisps and pot noodles could they live on before all their teeth fell out and lethargy prevented them from even getting out of bed? Not many I think. In this house the kitchen is a man’s domain. Meals are cooked from scratch and scoffed down thankfully. Hot and tasty meals cooked properly. The Girlf observes this alchemy with a jealous eye. I conjure magic she can only dream of wielding. My bolognaise is a steaming cauldron of flavors who’s origins she can’t fathom. They’re called herbs sweetheart.
And after they have eaten their fill of my creations they have to sit down with me and watch the football. Yes, we have Sky Sports and how she regrets getting it now. Tottenham are making head way in the champions’ league and there’s nothing she can do about it. O, what’s that you say? Knock out stages, top of our group? That’ll be another couple of Tuesdays booked then. Make yourselves comfortable girls, there’s a match on.
Life is indeed good. I have my girls, I have my whisky, I have the football and if it all gets too much, if the estrogen levels rise intolerably, then I have my gym to retreat to, a sparse man-room of cast iron and bare walls. Junk piled in every corner and coated in a fine layer of dust. It has all the charm of a garage and still possesses that tell tale echo that defines a room that could never be described as cozy.
Man-room.
