It is the day before
Christmas. And quite a few creatures are stirring, actually, though mostly
outside of the house. Slow, black beetles and skittery spiders and bees buzzing
around the rosemary bush and a bright green lizard disappearing between the
stones in the wall. Boy Cat rolling around contentedly in his favourite deck
chair, and the Black Cat That Coughs leaping through the grass, chasing a pale yellow
butterfly that she will never catch. Flies zooming in through the open windows,
and out again, back to the light. There is a lot of light.
Christmas Eve in
Sifnos and the town is all astir, despite the warnings and the scenes of mass
exodus at the port. This is not a town of ghosts. Everyone who’s still here is
here, it seems, picking up last minute supplies for dinner, and their pensions,
and presents from the two or three shops that are open, with stars and
snowflakes drawn in glitter across their windows. A lady in the supermarket is
looking for fresh mushrooms, which cannot be had; the butcher’s is busy, the
meat cleaver falling loudly, crunching bones. Cars crawl down the road,
blocking it frequently as they stop to exchange words with other cars, or
motorbikes, or people on foot. Everyone is going somewhere, but slowly, their
mellowness in contrast to the jagged, manic edges of every other Christmas Eve
I’ve known. I wouldn’t know, but for the decorations.
There is no Christmas
Village in the square, but the village knows it’s Christmas, and tinsel twinkles
everywhere as it catches the sun, sending strange reflections across the whitewashed
walls. A nativity scene, lifesize, has appeared in the yard of an unoccupied
building, and classical music drifts out the café up the road. Golden baubles
hang in windows and over doors, dangle from pergolas and awnings, and dance in
the breeze. The village knows it’s Christmas, despite the brightness that
causes everyone to raise their hands up and shade their eyes, and the warmth
that has them all loosening their scarves and wiping their brows. On every step
and every doorway there is someone lounging in the sun, with sleeves rolled up
to expose their arms to the heat. I take off layer after layer and end up
sitting on a high wall in my vest, with a bundle of clothes rolled up beside
me, looking over the edge of the land towards Paros, where our bigger island
neighbours are getting ready for Christmas, like we are, but with bigger roads
and bigger shops. I feel like waving, but I don’t. I’m getting enough curious
looks as it is, sitting here in a pink vest and leopard-print leggings, and
staring at the sea.
On the way back a
transition, through the outskirts of town where houses and shops give way to
fields and orchards, past the gas station, quiet, with long flags hanging limp
from long poles, and those funny little bundles that are curled up cats, on
ledges and rooftops, following me with their eyes, and several dogs, chained
and free, yelping excitedly when I get too close, and then onto the ring road,
private, sloping upwards just for me. I walk in the middle, along the white
dividing line, trusting in the absence of cars and half-blinded by the sun,
until I reach the top and the mouth of the grassy path carved by the stream
that will bring me home. There I stop, and listen, and look: Christmas Eve in
Sifnos. Mountaintops and sky. Bells, intermittent, as the animals shuffle from
one patch of grass to the next. Little birds twittering in the bushes, an eagle
flying silently overhead. A flock of doves, mostly white, cooing as they
alight, in perfect synchronicity, on a telephone wire. A cock crowing insistently
on a distant farm over the hill. In the valley below, the echo of a dull,
rhythmic tapping, manmade. Fields of the greenest green dotted with yellow and
purple flowers. A secret garden of citrus trees that I’ve never noticed before,
walled in amidst the olive groves. A single tree on a hilltop outlined against
the milky blue horizon. A stone dove house on the edge of a cliff,
semi-derelict, triangle openings and flapping wings. And everywhere around mountaintops
and sky. So much sky, for such a small piece of land.
Christmas Eve, and now
the church bells are ringing, summoning the faithful inside to sing the psalms
of Christmas in yellow flickering candlelight, as the day grows dark outside.
Boy Cat is still in his deck chair; he stirs as I pass him, and gives me a look
that is almost trust. I turn the lights on, all of them; the house seems
darker, somehow, at this time, just before sunset, than it does in the
blackness of night. I will do some yoga now, and cook dinner, and wait for the
church bells to ring again. I will not heed their call, but I will listen. They
make a lovely sound.
Christmas Eve,
undecorated. Of all the good decisions I’ve made or stumbled into, this is one
of the best. Christmas Eve in Sifnos, with nothing much to distinguish it from
any other day, and this is the one I’ll remember. Of all the Christmas Eves
I’ve spent in decorated houses, houses much brighter than this, with presents
and carols and tables laden with food, wearing the spiky garland of stress that
we wrap around each other for the holidays, like fairy lights tangled up in the
branches of the tree – this is the one. The only time I heard the church bells
ringing; the only time that sound has reached my faithless ears, free from the
noise of every other Christmas Eve I’ve known. I wouldn’t know, but for the
silence. This is the one that means something to me.
It is the night before
Christmas. And whatever it means to you, wherever you are, whether you’re where
you want to be or somewhere else, make it a happy one. The church bells are
ringing. You might not hear them through the noise, but they make a lovely
sound. You wouldn't know. But listen.
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