Carina and the Advent Calender

This post is for my three-year-old God-Daughter, Carina, and to mark the beginning of advent. In this post I aim to recapture some of the magic I felt as a child in the run up to Christmas.

I remember a lot about Decembers as a child. I remember the diamond-paned windows in my bedroom frosting over with patterns of stars of ice which looked so beautiful yet as though they would cut you if you touched them. I breathed on the inside of my window and traced the shapes in the mist of my breath and when I returned after school they had evaporated. 

I remember looking out of our bathroom window over the fields a pale greenish white under a layer of frost. I remember how crunchy that frost was underfoot and I remember the anticipation of ice and cold as I stood in our dining room, being bundled up in scarves and hats and mittens, staring out at our garden path, ready to dash out in a second once I was deemed well enough protected from the elements.

 

I remember porridge with cream and brown sugar, and how I saw the daylight begin as I was eating my breakfast. Mainly, however, December was the month when I got to open my advent calendar. When did I first have an advent calendar? I don’t remember, yet it seems it was always there, as inevitable a sign of the changing seasons as the darker days and longer nights. 

The first advent calendar I remember was a large picture of a gorgeous redbrick town house set against a night time blue sky, cloudless and starry. As I opened the windows I revealed more stars, one of them a shooting star, so iridescent I still thrill at the memory. Years later as an A level student studying Blake I remembered that comet with clarity on reading the lines – 

‘when the stars threw down their spears, 

and watered heaven with their tears.’

    To me, the beauty and grandeur and awe of the advent calendar was captured in those two lines.   

I  remember  how sometimes I longed to open the next day’s window just to see what it would bring. Some windows excited me more than others, for inexplicable reasons. I would fix on a date….December 19th say, and stare at that window every day, desperate to open it, perhaps because it was one of the more obvious ones and  directly in front of me. Other windows were hidden, and I had to comb the whole page with my eyes, sometimes several times before the number would jump out and I would exclaim at my idiocy at not seeing it before. Every day I would open my advent calendar as soon as I came downstairs, to reveal bells, baubles, fairies, reindeer, wise men, and any other number of wonderful things, as the contents of the magical red brick town house were slowly revealed.

My father, a playwright, wrote a Christmas radio play for children one year, entitled Carol and the Advent Calendar. In this play, Carol,  waking late one night alone and cold,  is tempted into the wooden advent calendar which her father has made and her venture inside causes time to stand still. She fights an evil clock master who wishes to ban Christmas and helps Father Christmas to ensure the magic day  does dawn after all. I listened to a recording of this play every year…and I longed to climb into my advent calendar, however briefly, and  explore the land and rooms within. In Carol and the Advent Calendar Carol sings –

 ‘In those little windows, 

  all is warm and bright,

  I’d be safe within those

tiny, little rooms tonight’ 

Unlike the motherless Carol, I had nothing to run away from, no reason to long to disappear into the advent calendar except curiosity. Yet this did not stop me from peering through those little windows and wondering about the world beyond.

This year, my beautiful God Daughter. Carina, is turning three at the beginning of December. I think she is just  old enough to be excited by an advent calendar, even if her fingers are too childlike to prise open the windows. She  can still try and she can still watch the windows being opened by her mother, Kirsty. She is possibly old enough to begin to grasp the sense of anticipation which comes with an advent calendar too, the build up to Christmas and the way its closeness is marked every day with an image. 

This afternoon I am going out to buy Carina’s first advent calendar at Jenners, Edinburgh’s oldest, grandest, most beautiful department store. It is a golden sandstone building, strikingly similar in style to my old advent calendar, and at the moment, it too is filled with stars, paper cutout snowflakes and sparkly things (especially clothes and shoes, which are desperately tempting but sadly out of my reach). 

Found on google images, as all pictures in this article; This is the window of a toyshop in Chicago in the 1930s. I found it at once beautiful and slightly sinister, as all the best toys are. You have to believe they will come to life.

Grown up toys...I try not to linger too long in the make-up department

The toy department is  magical and I can still imagine the toys waiting until they are sure that the security guard has locked the front door for the night, before they come out to play at the designer makeup counters on the first floor.

I hope Carina loves her advent calendar and can imagine the world beyond the windows, one she can enter in her dreams, which causes her to long for  next morning, when she can open the next window,  which she has already probably traced and learnt the shape of with her fingers, guessing desperately at what could be behind it. 

A child's imagination makes the magic of Christmas real once again

On Boxing Day my calendar would be taken down from the wall and my mother would iron it under a towel, closing all the windows for another year. My red brick calendar lasted three years before disintegrating, and every year I would discover the windows anew. 

A wonderfully vintage looking advert for Jenners...it is in fact from 2008, but I love imagining that it is from the 1950s.

Now I'm off to Jenners to find the most beautiful advent calendar I can. Today is so clear that the sky above Jenners will be inky blue and starry by early evening, also we’ve had one or two meteorites lately. Maybe I am finally going through those little windows.

The Flaws of Perfection

I like imperfection, the beauty that lies in a fallen eyelash on a dewy cheek, an escaped wisp of hair below a rigid ballerina bun, a vest strap which falls down in the summer to reveal a strip of lighter skin which the sun has not yet seen. I like these things because they are real, human and utterly lovely in their candidness, endearing as a child who says the wrong thing and in doing so reveals some deep truth which adults have long forgotten. 

The poets knew the power of imperfection, Shakespeare famously writing to his mistress whose eyes were ‘nothing like the sun,’ a sonnet which was later taken by Lorenz Hart as the template for his song Funny Valentine in which he asks: ‘Is your figure less than Greek? Is your mouth a little weak?’

Yet many advertisers in the world of cosmetics seem to have forgotten the potency of the less than ideal; the way it stirs within us a feeling of tenderness and recognition. 

Actress and Model Natalia Vodianova looking human, a little flawed, slightly shiny round the forehead, yet absolutely gorgeous. Her imperfection and quixotic personal style add to her beauty.

 The beautiful but flawed face which arrests the vision and forces one to look again is becoming rarer in the pages of glossy magazines. Instead we have the airbrushed perfection of L’Oreal ads, where the most exquisite of models are stripped of their human beauty and made to look strangely robotic in the case of Linda Evangelista, or doll-like in the case of Doutzen Kroes. Even the beautiful Frieda Pinto is rendered ordinary by the perfecting mechanisms of L’Oreal, while Penelope Cruz, sensual and feisty on screen, is so hardened by the L’Oreal polish that even her tumbling dark mane doesn’t soften her. 

Supermodel Linda Evangelista airbrushed to the point where she barely looks human. Is this really what the makeup companies think we want to look like? Does any woman truly want to look like this?

Rimmel adverts can also be terrible, managing, by some remarkable feat of aesthetic bludgeoning, to make both Lily Cole and Kate Moss look ordinary. How on earth do they do it?

Do these companies think that women aspire to look bland, perfected, flawless beyond the limits of their mortality? Or do they think that by making these beautiful models and actresses so bland they are bringing them nearer to the average, something which women can at once aspire to and not feel threatened by?

Lily Cole by Rimell...and below Lily as herself, embracing her own pre-raphaelite beauty. Which one do you prefer?

Whatever the reason is for this dull advertising, I call on cosmetics companies to stop it. It is at once ubiquitous and patronising. It is selling a lie which women not only disbelieve but no longer wish to hear.

Yes, airbrushing is okay and is to be expected, even demanded of fashion, that realm of fantasy and dreams. What I also demand from adverts is some individuality, something whimsical and different and unique. I like the Miss Dior Cherie Advert, where Maryna Linchuk floats away holding onto a bunch of balloons. If you look closely at this and other adverts in the same series you will see that her hair is wind-blown and the dark shadows cast by her heavy brows are still visible, adding to her reality, her loveliness, her youth, her beauty.

Like the top image this is taken from the Miss Dior Cherie advert, directed by the wonderful Sofia Coppola. I love the sense of fun and frivolity this whole campaign. To me it encapsulates what fashion and makeup should really be...an extension of your identity and individual beauty, as opposed to the bland cover-all look, advocated by too many beauty companies.

Twenty Four Hours In Edinburgh

This post is part of the 'Twenty Four Hours in Your City' Blog project, which involves bloggers from all over the world writing about what they would do with a guest in twenty four hours in their city. Please don't read my post for accuracy...the aim of this is to be fantastical, a dream twenty four hours in this city, rather than one grounded by the limitations of reality. I was told about this project by Siobhan,a freelance writer, fashionista and animal lover who has a wonderful blog here ... http://www.facetsofthefabulous.blogspot.com/

We begin at six o clock in the morning, I am not usually up at this
time, but today I’m awake long before counting the minutes as my
friend is borne towards me by a large yellow Megabus moving
soundlessly through the night.

I am out of my back door at 5.30, even though it takes less than
twenty minutes to walk to the bus station, I am eager not to be late,
and wide awake. I am able to run to the bus station in my flip flops,
as it is a miraculously warm morning towards the end of April, and as
the sky gradually pales from inky to chalky blue, the moon, still
visible begins to fade.

At the bus station I pace up and down, edgy as hell, constantly
glancing at my phone, until the man at the information stand says ‘All
right Hen?’ Something I like about Edinburgh is that people are nice.
They genuinely give a damn about you.

However, that moment my friend’s bus rolls in on time. And I watch by
the entrance as he gets off the bus, his rucksack over one arm, his
clothes just so in their slight scruffiness. We greet one another,
stiffly with a hug, then I ask him if he is tired after his night time
journey. He tells me he isn’t tired in the least, so we go back to my
flat, where we quickly dump his stuff, and then we are straight out
again.

I live right by Holyrood Park, and my flat is overlooked by the
magnificent Arthur’s seat, the highest point in Edinburgh. Climbing to
the top is remarkably easy if the weather is being lovely, as it is
today, and you can choose whether you want to take a gentle or
ramblacious route. We decided to climb the steps, then scramble over
the rocks to the top. On a good day, like this, the visibility is
amazing, meaning it is possible to see right across the Firth of Forth
and all of Fife, and then even further away, to make out the shapes of
the often Snow-Capped Highlands. At the highest point there is an engraved
circular steel disc, reminiscent of a sundial, which if you look closely it
tells you exactly what you are looking at, every direction you face.

We stand at the top of Arthur’s seat, exhilarated by the view and the
walk, before scrambling down from the top, then taking the gentle path
down which takes us to Dunsapie Loch, which we walk around the
perimeter off, looking at the baby ducklings and the swans.

By the time we are back from the park it is almost 8pm, and as my
friend wants breakfast I take him to Ollie Bongo’s, a red fronted
café, with a bistro feel, close to Bristo Square where the University
mixes old buildings with new. In the café I drink coffee, I am rubbish
in the mornings and am incapable of being a breakfast person, in spite
of knowing the importance of waking up your body however, I order my
friend a smoked salmon bagel with salad and cream cheese (something I
have had at lunchtime, and one of the most delicious things ever.)
Here we lie back against the plush red cushions and watch people out
of the window, including the throng of students running to be on time
for their nine o'clock class.

Yet something is unusual about the day. The light is changing in a way
you would not normally expect, and as we step out the temperature is a
couple of degrees higher, meaning I have to shed my cardigan and tie it
around my waist. As we wander back through town, I am amazed that the
flowers and trees have changed, the leaves are thicker and the birches
have lost their sapling beauty, replacing it with something more
flirtatious and knowing. We walk past the Islamic green grocers near
Nicholson Square, and outside there are luscious displays of
strawberries, raspberries and juicy ripe tomatoes. I stop and look at
my phone….we have been catapulted into June.

We wander round town, walking slowly along the Royal Mile, and smiling
at all the people in their summer clothes. It is by now a full blown
heat wave, and although the city centre is a wonderful place to be, we
are craving the sea side. One of the magnificent things about
Edinburgh, so often overlooked, is the fact that it is surrounded be
beautiful beaches. We run back to my flat….it’s now eleven and I feel
like the day is escaping…and we grab my bike, and my flatmates bike
(somehow it is the perfect size for my friend) and we head off once
more towards the Park.

Just within the park is a red gravel lane, which weaves through trees
and sunlight and shadows, before turning into the Innocent Railway
cycle path. Once a twelve mile steam railway which transported coal to
Edinburgh, the Innocent Railway is now a beautiful cycle path, with
beautiful wild shrubbery on either side. If you continue along the
path you pass through Duddingston, the Jewel and then finally you are
in Musselburgh, spinning down the hill at top speed towards the long
dusty golden beach. We run into the sea, our bikes chained to the
railings and then after about half an hour we run out, our hair salty,
and our bodies goose pimpled. We throw soft white towels around
ourselves and sit and eat our sandwiches. The day is getting warmer,
even though it is now two in the afternoon, and as we shiver the day
warms us, and we lie back on the beach, until three when we cycle back
to Edinburgh.

It is less the five hours since we left the city, but when we get
back, once again something imperceptible has changed. We put the bikes
away and rush into town. The streets are strangely crowded, and there
are pieces of paper on the ground every where. A young student stops
us and asks if we want to go and see his company’s play. It’s only on
until August 14th, he tells us. Once again I glance at my phone, and
discover that time has leapt forward. We are in the midst of the
headiest, most feverish, awesome theatre festival in the world.

We wander along the Royal Mile slowly and stop and watch street
performers. One of them, a peripatetic magician decided to grab my
friend from the audience. He makes him eat fire. I wince, but my
friend laughs. Suddenly I feel heady and dizzy and mad from all the
crowds. We rush to a pub but can’t find anywhere to sit, so we dash
down to Princes Street, and then along to George Street, where we sit
in All Bar One, the one bar which is quiet during the festival,
perhaps due to it looking far grander and pricier than it really is.
There we sit and sip on pints on Amstel as we peruse our Fringe
programmes, and decide what show we are going to see. We can only see
one, so I opt for a play by renowned theatre company Belt Up.


We go to C-Soco and rush in to see the show, just before the door closes.
I love Belt Up, I love their quirkiness, the way they include the
audience in their work, the intimacy of the venues they choose. I love
the way some of their plays are off beat interpretations of well known
myths, and I love the heartbreaking combination of comedy and pathos
with which they perform.

When we leave it is 8pm, and although it is still clear, the daylight
has already gone to be replaced by numerous stars. This is unusual for
August; more unusual however is the drop in temperature, which leaves
me shivering into my friend’s jacket. My instinct is to go back to my
flat, to stay warm, but glancing at my phone I notice it is the 24th
of November, the day when the Christmas Market opens. We run to
Princes Street, anything better that staying still in this weather,
and then we dash along to Princes’ street Gardens to join the skaters
on the ice rink.

I cannot skate well and often fall over, but this time a kind of magic
descends, and we skate together seamlessly, along with the other
skaters. All of us elegant and agile and beautiful. Afterwards, we go
to one of the food stands for Gluhwein, and Stollen, and then it is
time to go back to my flat and collapse.