This time of year is usually marked by last minute gift shopping, booking flights to see my grandparents in France, and calling my cousins to coordinate Christmas outfits. It’s mid-November and I’m in my room in college, no flight home under my name, not knowing which of three countries I am going to spend Christmas in.

Christmas has always felt too artificial to me, the actual night always falling slightly short of the anticipation built up by decorations, Christmas music and TV adverts which all kick in as soon as pumpkins are thrown away on the 1st of November. My large family Christmases make me feel like we are puppets playing the perfect family in a movie, going to church even though you’ll never find us there on any other day of the year, eating more food than enjoyable, smiling at the family member you never speak to and pretending to take great interest in their career change. Cue the family drama: whether it’s because that one uncle arrived late or the politics talk and old grievances all coming out once my grandparents have had one glass too many. Any other year you could’ve told me Christmas was cancelled and I would probably have been relieved. This year, the potential reality of spending Christmas alone, with no grand meal or adorned tree, has made me reflect on what Christmas, behind all its superficiality, is really about.

"As you grow up, move away, move on, you leave some parts of your childhood behind"

Having always lived abroad from my extended family means I rarely see them. Twice a year is a luxury, once every two years more of the norm. Sitting down over a meal with people who sometimes feel more like strangers than vital parts of my life reminds me of the strange and unique concept of family. As you grow up, move away, move on, you leave some parts of your childhood behind. More often than not, these are the people and things you wish you could have kept by your side.

I’ve found family roots to be so deeply entrenched that they don’t need as much tending to as other relationships. These connections are ones which do not simply fade with time or distance. Although we all do different things and live on all sides of the globe, our blood link keeps us interconnected. Seeing my family at Christmas has never been just about eating good food and getting presents, it is a way to reconnect to my French culture, one which my parents work so hard to keep alive in our everyday life living in Poland. Even though we exclusively speak the romance language at home, cook French food and watch our national version of Gordon Ramsey weekly on TV, having never lived in France, I am sometimes led to question my national identity. However, spending a quintessential French Christmas surrounded by some of the most stereotypically French people I have ever met reinforces the feeling of comfort that I do belong there.

Even though these traditions of waiting to open our presents before dessert, our family picture on the stairs, and playing Christmas carols on the piano can all feel a bit orchestrated, I’ve learnt to appreciate that that is what traditions are. We keep them alive to try and recreate the childlike excitement of Christmas, to make the one day every two years that we are all together as special as it can be. Christmas traditions are pure nostalgia, a way to fill the gaps that might have formed over the years. They are what keep people and memories alive, make you realise there is more to life than your day-to-day, what you can countdown to in darker moments of melancholy and grief. This Christmas, wherever I spend it, will be the first one since my grandma’s passing. Maybe we’ll decide to trade the traditional ‘Bûche de Noël’ for her famous crêpes, a way of having her with us on Christmas Eve. 

The fear of spending Christmas in college is one I brought with me at the beginning of term, simultaneously trying to ignore it with the naive positivity that there wouldn’t be another lockdown. Six weeks in, I am very lucky to say that were I unable to go home, I would be spending it with my college family; people who aren’t family but who I already love and care about deeply.

"I look back at this memory and see the real value of Christmas; being with people you love no matter the environment surrounding you."

It certainly wouldn’t be the picture perfect white Christmas, the best ones rarely are. My memories of family Christmases have been distorted with time, tangled up with idealised versions taken from movies like Home Alone and Love Actually. The best Christmas I have ever celebrated was sailing with my close family, all squashed in a tiny kitchen, eating tomato pasta with no space in our luggage for physical presents, gifts taking the shape of homemade gift vouchers. The liberating feelings of not having to organise a perfect meal weeks in advance, worrying someone won’t like their gift, or work emergencies ripping my parents away, allowed us to be present in the moment, just the five of us. I look back at this memory and see the real value of Christmas: being with people you love no matter the environment surrounding you. 

Whether I spend this Christmas in Cambridge, at home with my parents in Poland, or in France with my horde of aunts, uncles and cousins, I know the people I love are healthy and somewhere in the world. The ones who aren’t live on through the impact they’ve had on my life and the traditions they’ve left behind. The joy of Christmas does not have to solely exist on the 25th of December (or the 24th for my fellow Europeans). Once the world starts regaining a bit of normalcy, even if this is in the middle of a July heatwave, I will have my family reunion, which is the only real reason I count down the chocolate-shaped days to Christmas anyway.