Wattignies 19 hours. Everything is ready, or almost. The last toast is being buttered in the kitchen. There is foie gras, of course, salmon, various appetizers: sausages, prunes with a small piece of bacon around, Cheez-Its of course, peanuts, and who knows what else. The capon is cooked for a long time, it will be heated and baked in a timely manner. There are a lot of dishes filled with various vegetables all sauces, roast beef, so I think, but I'm not sure, is not I who do the cooking. In the dining room, the Christmas tree weighed down with ornaments made its appearance a few days ago, and his feet of space was gradually filled with presents, most wrapped in newsprint, because any so, why bother with a paper gift class that will be torn and thrown on the ground in Within a few seconds? The coffee table was pushed to make room. It took a dinner table to add to that already, in fact the plastic table in the garden, but covered with the red sheet of paper, it shows that fire. Around the plates, knives, forks, crystal glasses, there are various decorations, gray gray cute as can be, Father Christmas, miniature deer, miniature miniature silver metallic garlands, and then a small box in front of each cover with photo the person who will occupy. I will not lie to you telling you that I have actively participated in all these preparations. I confined myself to create the play-list for Christmas on the iPod, which, when connected to the mini-chain, will provide a background to quiet conversations. Nothing too complicated: the Beatles, the Beach Boys, the Pogues, but a little too Phish, Aretha Franklin of course, the Stones, the Talking Heads, and if people want to dance, we can arrange.
Tonight we celebrate Christmas with the family of Papa. English clan. A few people, but it remains reasonable, fourteen people, just the close, his sister, her husband, her two daughters, their husbands, their four kids, and my mother and my brother, of course. We think of Grandma, who was absent for six Christmases. At the same time in Barcelona Madrid and the south of France, lots of cousins that I have never seen or will almost do the same. Tomorrow we begin again with the family of Mom, the Franco-French, always at home, almost as many people. I'm lucky: the years pass, but the days of Christmas remained roughly the same for twenty-five years. That is to say something good, decidedly good, that I always look forward to. A brief respite, a temporary bubble of comfort before returning to the front, to real life and real hassle. When the children of my cousins open their gifts and shouting, I'm back there are fifteen, twenty years ago when I was in their shoes, gifts are not quite the same, but the scene is identical. The cycle repeats itself, it's nice. They are important to me, these traditions. When all around us, everything tends to go from bad to worse, it's nice to have a fixed anchor point, something soft and warm to what return each year, something that will make us as well, something that brings me back because it was still better before.
I'm lucky, because this is not the case for everyone. It is easy to forget, but for lots and lots of people, Christmas is a pain an old wound that reopens every year. There are those for whom Christmas is especially growing up with separated parents, where the meals gloomy picture is never complete, and can never again be. There are those who are grieving every Christmas, or we can only think of those who left and never returned. There are all those hundreds of thousands, even millions, who will spend Christmas Eve alone, so alone, forever alone, people mostly elderly, for whom the smile of launching the TV presenter blooper not warm the heart. They will receive no email, no SMS on their mobile Portable, which will remain hopelessly dumb. And I do not even talk about those for whom the main concern tonight is not to be cold. Christmas is that loneliness is the hardest to bear is at Christmas that the idea of happiness and its absence is most cruel to those who have not.
I'm lucky. My parents were not always happy, I'm not sure that they are today, because happiness is something so difficult, so fragile these days, it seems, the more one gets, the more it's complicated, but I am fortunate to have been raised in a home free from violence, physical as mental. My parents had limited means, but they spoiled me, physically as much as they could, and their affection was never dry, and does not dry up. There is so much money in the world, people around the world, and ultimately so little love. Often I get to feel alone, alone immensely grateful to my travels, I accumulate disappointments, regrets and disappointments, but deep down I know that at home, there's a little even many, of this love, it's there for me when I need it, I can come back as often as possible. I'm lucky.
What makes life worth living? The answer to this question is simple, so simple, but that does not an easy question either. Most of our problems are not complicated, they are just intractable, which is quite different. If you have something with you that makes you feel happy to be alive, be blessed. Maybe you remember, maybe not, basically it's not very serious. And if you're still looking, do not lose hope. I think of you tonight.
Tonight we celebrate Christmas with the family of Papa. English clan. A few people, but it remains reasonable, fourteen people, just the close, his sister, her husband, her two daughters, their husbands, their four kids, and my mother and my brother, of course. We think of Grandma, who was absent for six Christmases. At the same time in Barcelona Madrid and the south of France, lots of cousins that I have never seen or will almost do the same. Tomorrow we begin again with the family of Mom, the Franco-French, always at home, almost as many people. I'm lucky: the years pass, but the days of Christmas remained roughly the same for twenty-five years. That is to say something good, decidedly good, that I always look forward to. A brief respite, a temporary bubble of comfort before returning to the front, to real life and real hassle. When the children of my cousins open their gifts and shouting, I'm back there are fifteen, twenty years ago when I was in their shoes, gifts are not quite the same, but the scene is identical. The cycle repeats itself, it's nice. They are important to me, these traditions. When all around us, everything tends to go from bad to worse, it's nice to have a fixed anchor point, something soft and warm to what return each year, something that will make us as well, something that brings me back because it was still better before.
I'm lucky, because this is not the case for everyone. It is easy to forget, but for lots and lots of people, Christmas is a pain an old wound that reopens every year. There are those for whom Christmas is especially growing up with separated parents, where the meals gloomy picture is never complete, and can never again be. There are those who are grieving every Christmas, or we can only think of those who left and never returned. There are all those hundreds of thousands, even millions, who will spend Christmas Eve alone, so alone, forever alone, people mostly elderly, for whom the smile of launching the TV presenter blooper not warm the heart. They will receive no email, no SMS on their mobile Portable, which will remain hopelessly dumb. And I do not even talk about those for whom the main concern tonight is not to be cold. Christmas is that loneliness is the hardest to bear is at Christmas that the idea of happiness and its absence is most cruel to those who have not.
I'm lucky. My parents were not always happy, I'm not sure that they are today, because happiness is something so difficult, so fragile these days, it seems, the more one gets, the more it's complicated, but I am fortunate to have been raised in a home free from violence, physical as mental. My parents had limited means, but they spoiled me, physically as much as they could, and their affection was never dry, and does not dry up. There is so much money in the world, people around the world, and ultimately so little love. Often I get to feel alone, alone immensely grateful to my travels, I accumulate disappointments, regrets and disappointments, but deep down I know that at home, there's a little even many, of this love, it's there for me when I need it, I can come back as often as possible. I'm lucky.
What makes life worth living? The answer to this question is simple, so simple, but that does not an easy question either. Most of our problems are not complicated, they are just intractable, which is quite different. If you have something with you that makes you feel happy to be alive, be blessed. Maybe you remember, maybe not, basically it's not very serious. And if you're still looking, do not lose hope. I think of you tonight.
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