Well, there you have it. Christmas is over. Finished. Done for. There are more than 350 days until Christmas 2025 – good, because I’ve got a lot to do before the next festive period.
Christmas was simple; Christmas Day and Boxing Day were both spent with my parents (and Bryan’s grandparents), and we then had an evening and a day with Bryan’s siblings. They came up with their mum and dad to see Bryan in panto this last Friday – which, as you might imagine, made Bryan incredibly happy. It’s lovely to spend time with them, and Bryan got to show his dancing off to his siblings. Given that family and dancing are two of the most important things in his life, then it’s been a good week for him – for both of us.
I have a few different things planned over the next week – but most importantly, just spending time with my son. It’s nice to have a fortnight off; even with a significant portion of it given over to the Sarah Thorne panto, we’ve still had a chance to rest and relax.
Talking of panto, we went to see the Marlowe panto in Canterbury on Monday – Beauty and the Beast. It’s a panto tradition for the two of us; we browse the market stalls, have lunch out, and pop into the library. I was disappointed that the library’s galleries were closed, as there had been an exhibit I wanted to share with Bryan, but we still spent some time in the library, and that was lovely.
The Marlowe itself is a lovely theatre, and we love seeing a panto full of daftness, jokes, and good humour. Ben Roddy is a perennial favourite of ours; he plays the Dame, and does it so incredibly well. He’d been sick on a precious week, so Bryan and I had our fingers crossed that he was better – and, thank heavens, he was. It was great fun, and it’s nice to have these traditions every year – it really makes Christmas special.
I’ve not had a huge amount of time to sit down and write over Christmas, but I intend to carve some time over the next week to be creative. It might not be as much as I’m used to, but it’s going to be nice to sit and use my creativity for a while. I want to spend some quality time in 2025 on my creative writing; I can’t wait to expand my horizons by finding my discipline again to write.
I find that routine and structure is the best way to be creative. That might sound counter-intuitive, but by being structured – making some time to sit down and not have any distractions – often yields results. It might not be very much time, but it’s time I wouldn’t otherwise have had. I used to have a few hours I could devote to my creativity, but being a dad, my focus has moved elsewhere – and I don’t begrudge that for a single micro-second. But when I do find those few precious moments to write, they’re a blessing, and I intend to savour them when they appear.
2025 is also the year Bryan sits his first GCSE. I’m pleased; it spreads out the responsibility and pressure over more years, rather than putting it all into the intensity of a single year. I’ll be proud of him no matter what happens, but it’s a privilege to see him giving his all to it.
GCSEs were predominantly the same when I did them back in 1997 (27 years have passed since them – did I blink and miss something?). They were more low-tech, however; laptops were in their infancy, and the internet relied on your mum not picking up the home phone while you were trying to type on a message board. Bryan’s school is very intuitive and thoughtful when it comes to exams, and I feel very informed and involved with the entire process. The more involved I am, of course, the better I can support Bryan over the next few years. Now that’s something I can get behind.
