Looking forward to a happy X-mas - Day 1

Day 1 (Friday 1st December 2017)

One single Yule log was the celebrated heart of the household in times gone by
- in Northern Europe, at the darkest part of the year, it was traditional for a tree to be cut down
and dragged into the house to be burnt. It provided warmth and cheer and encouraged feasting.
A small piece was saved to the following year to act as kindling for the new log.
When Christianity took hold this pagan tradition was amended - in Germany it
became the Christmas tree. Nowadays it is often represented by a log-shaped cake.
Painting by Sir John Gilbert depicting Henry VIII greeting the Yule Log

It is the first day of Advent. It is with great pleasure that I welcome to the 2017 Advent Blogs Series, with pieces written on the theme of Darkness and Dawn. It is both a privilege and an honour to host this annual event. I know from people's comments, when they submit posts, and also from the observations that have been made on social media, that this series has become a much loved and eagerly anticipated annual tradition. I can promise you some wonderful blogs over the next few weeks. Last night I attended the most beautiful carol service, held by candlelight in St Bartholomew's church near Smithfield, the oldest church in London. It was exquisite, so much so that it reduced one of my colleagues to tears. It is an annual event, hosted by LHH Penna, and I always used to say that it was "the start of Christmas". Now that milestone has been usurped - the launch of the Advent Blog series is the commencement of the festive period for me. It gives me great joy to bid you "Welcome!"

The first post in this year's Series is written by Mark Hendy. Those of you who read his Advent Blog post of last year will probably remember that he lives in Wales and is a devoted dad to young Oscar, indeed being a father made him reevaluate his priorities. Mark is a highly respected HR professional and is a lynchpin in the HR social media and wider community. He established #HRHour, which takes place on Twitter every Thursday at 8.00pm GMT and is an excellent forum for the sharing of ideas and opinions (you can find out more by following @HR_Hour on Twitter) and I am sure that Mark would be delighted if you joined in. In addition, he is an active participant in #ldinsight discussions every Friday at 8.00am GMT on Twitter via @L&DConnect (his Twitter handle is @markSWHRF) and he both founded and chairs the South Wales HR Forum. He writes an excellent blog - Hendys HR Blog. In addition to HR and enhancing work and the workplace, Mark is an avid music fan (and musician) he also enjoys boxing and supporting Swansea FC (not at the same time). He is a genuinely an all-round good guy and well worth getting to know.

Mark's post touches on his love of being a parent, but be warned, it is a sobering read as well as reminding us that "this is the seasonal time for giving"...

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I’m writing this piece in November, at that point in the month where thinking about planning for Christmas is necessary. I’m at that particular mid-point between being jealous of those annoying people who cheerily brag about having completed their Christmas shopping (get a life!), and not being one of those who runs around on a fool's errand on Christmas Eve like Arnold Schwarzenegger in the movie ‘Jingle All The Way’..

Before having a family, I was a ‘do everything the week before’ type of person.

Not anymore.

I think about Christmas during my commute to work, a one hour drive in darkness across the South Wales Valleys, a route that rides parallel to my home town of Neath and across the Neath Valley, before it takes me up over Merthyr, where I drive on a dual-carriageway that runs above Merthyr’s Gurnos Estate, a notorious and vast council estate unfairly denigrated over the years, but undoubtedly a place with social problems. It is probably also filled with oodles of love and citizenship too, but people don’t seem to talk about that.

I think about a lot when I’m driving. I think about things I need to, things I want to, and of course, with the brain being a complex thing, I sometimes think about things that I could do with not thinking about. I’m human, and that’s normal.

But recently i’ve been thinking about Christmas.

Each year at this holiday season, my workplace supports a charity called The Mr X Appeal which started in 1959 when a gentleman from the South of England decided to do something. Mr X started with the aim of ensuring that children from disadvantaged backgrounds across the region who might not otherwise receive any presents on Christmas day, would wake up to at least one gift. The scheme transferred from the South of England to South Wales when Mr X relocated to the area some years later.

Mr X remained anonymous his entire life until he passed away at age 92 in 2016 when his identity was revealed as Mr Tom Bravin. Mr Bravin wanted to remain anonymous for this work as he did not want any of the spotlight to be on him, but to be on the good charity of those who donated gifts, and to focus on the plight of poverty across the country.

Mr Bravin, you are a hero.

Tom Bravin

The charity has continued since Mr Bravin’s passing, through a team of volunteers that he had assembled a few years before his death, and so his legacy lives on and each year more children are supported.

The way that the scheme works is that public bodies and charities provide to the team at Mr X the first names and basic details (gender and age) of children across South Wales who would be unlikely to receive any gifts at Christmas. Mr X acts as a middle-man to assign each child to someone who wishes to take part in the scheme and provide a gift/gifts. Obviously anonymity and safeguarding of real identities is extremely important. Many businesses and individuals across South Wales take part and last year over 4,500 gifts were donated.

Mr X Appeal - the facebook page is https://www.facebook.com/MrXAppeal/

So last week I made my annual phone call to the team at Mr X to be given the details of the children we could support this year. Usually we take the details of 2 children and so this year we have the same. The team at Mr X gave me details of the first child. A little girl who is just over a year old.

Then came the details of the second child. A boy near enough the same age as my son, 4.

This hit me like a dagger in the heart that manifested itself in an awkward silence. A lump in the throat formed and a tear grew. Something hit home that affected me and I’ve not been able to stop thinking about it since.

I’ve been thinking about how a child like my son might have received nothing if we hadn’t made that call. I’ve been thinking about what the little boy knows and understands about Christmas and how difficult it’s going to be for him and/or his family.

Does he understand that he might not wake up to a gift?

Does he write Christmas lists in a school classroom for Father Christmas that he understands are likely to be irrelevant? Does he feel compelled to lie to his friends about what he thinks he’s going to get, whilst other children embellish enthusiastically as little children do, about what Santa is going to bring them?

Does he see and experience the heartache likely to be felt by his parents who watch on helplessly knowing that they are not in a position to provide a gift this year whilst most other children will receive something?

Does he even want anything, or would he prefer his siblings and parents receive something instead, if, of course, he has any?

Where will he wake up and what will Christmas morning be like for him?

And I think and worry about the parents too, not that I know whether he has any, and about what they must be going through. How are they surviving at this time of year? How much pressure must they be under and how cruel is it that this merry season has been commercialised to the extent that it creates this form of weight on the shoulders of so many.

And I think about my little boy, and how I would hate to be in the position of not being able to provide for him at Christmas. I think about the soundbites that say that most families are only ever “2 pay cheques away from poverty” and how I’m going to work so hard for the rest of my life to give him everything that he needs.

And then I feel guilty, because whilst it is awful that any child might wake up without a gift to open, the one I seem to think more about of the two children nominated for us, is the little boy, which I rationalise is due to the fact that I have a son the same age.

Each day, I leave the house and it’s still pitch black as I set off at around 6.45am for my journey to work. Each day as I drive in the darkness I think about this little boy who I don’t know and is the same age as my son. Each day I wish, somehow, I could do more.

Around 25% of the UK’s population is in relative poverty after housing costs, and that figure is closer to 30% when we look at children. Recently, The Independent reported that “the number of looked after children hit a new high of 72,670 in the 12 months to March 2017”. Over a million people used food banks between April 2016 to March 2017, and the horror stories are getting worse as the new Universal Credit benefits system continues to be problematic.

This is a tough time for so many.

But there is light, even, if not more so, at Christmas. There is dawn.

All across the country, people are doing stuff to help others at this time of year. 

People are taking part in the Mr X Appeal, volunteering at homeless shelters and donating to food banks.

People are rallying around family and friends and doing all they can to offer support and kindness.

People are making plans for elderly loved ones to make sure they’re not lonely.

People in care homes and at refuge centres are working hard to make people feel and experience the true spirit of Christmas, to feel loved, wanted, happy, warm and safe.

Outstanding acts of kindness and selflessness take place such as Sarah Millican’s #joinin twitter discussion on Christmas Day where people who are alone can have company online and talk with others throughout the day.

Amazing people are doing, and plan to do, amazing things. This is beautiful and is the very best in humanity. Because whilst it’s not perfect out there, there are many, many acts of kindness that help a lot of people in so many different ways. If the tough times are our darkness, only kindness can be our dawn.

(*Poverty Stats from the DWP, Households Below Average Income 2015/16 report, food bank usage from the ons website)

Deep-rooted

Like many little girls, Daddy was my hero. Good-looking, popular, intelligent, strong, fun to do things with, especially: singing with gusto as we drove in the car (carolling our own ludicrous lyrics); escaping together on fishing expeditions (no matter that we often returned empty handed); building dams; and playing dragons - I remember, as though it was yesterday, squealing with a mixture of delight and terror as I tried to escape from my father and Lord Griffiths while they ran after me, their fingers curled like claws, snarling, roaring and hurling insults while they tried to catch me off guard. (Sir Hugh was a close family friend and a wonderful man with the most astounding eyebrows, a razor-sharp wit and such a sense of fun and compassion, especially for children, that it was almost tangible. It was with huge sadness that I read of Hugh’s death at the end of May; my thoughts are with his family and friends - he was an excellent father and husband, an eminent Law Lord, and a fine sportsman (President of the MCC). He will be much missed). 

Sir Hugh Griffiths

Sir Hugh made a mean but enthralling dragon (perhaps he learned his skills when he successfully took on a German tank single–handed in 1944 and won, which earned him a Military Cross).

My father and his friends had, and still have, a huge impact on me.

My father in his 30s

I gained my love of stories from Daddy’s bedtime tales when I was tiny (I still smile at memories of piglets leaping from balloons to be caught in blankets and animals crossing the rainbow bridge to dreamland) - his imagination helped my own to roam amazing lands and meet incredible creatures without fear (the on-going story of my life); 

his constant questioning, he is a lawyer, so it is in his DNA, has given me an enquiring mind; and, regardless of my gender, he always had faith in me (despite his disappointment at my not being a son, resulting in his eventually leaving my mother as she only gave birth to girls, and his treating me, his eldest, as a quasi boy until I was a teenager – there are potentially irritating down-sides to this: I learned traditional male manners and, even now, will automatically open a door for others and usher them through in front of me; walk on the kerb-side to protect my companion from mud and danger; and leap to my feet whenever a person older than myself joins the table.)

Perhaps the major positive of being my father’s eldest child was that I neither doubted the appropriateness nor my ability to do or try something. I never thought about my gender as an issue when growing up – I was just “me”. I was the leader of a gang (it was immaterial that the other members were all boys). We built camps (indeed a hollowed out mound, used as a secret retreat (it took us ages to excavate it), collapsed under the weight of a marauding relative during a game of dragons), we climbed trees and we competed against and encouraged each other in acts of daring and skill – carefree friendships based on trust and mutual exuberance – the best foundation for relationships with others at any stage in life.

Despite appearances, this post is not about an apparently idyllic childhood, but is the second of two concerning the influence that parents have on their children. I am writing this from an idyllic spot in Wales, where I am spending the weekend with my father and eldest son. We are relaxed and happy. I am very good friends with my father and I have joyful memories of my early years, but my parents suffered a turbulent marriage (my cousins once found me trembling and weeping in their shed, when I was convinced that my parents had killed each other during a fight). Things turned really sour when I was a young teenager. Eventually my parents underwent a brutal separation from which my mother has yet to recover. My siblings (a decade younger than me) remain hurt and bewildered by the angry and bitter environment in which they were raised. 

There is no doubt that fighting parents damage the emotional growth of children.  My youngest sister regularly berates me for having happy memories and a deep love for our parents – the difference between her and my attitude must be founded in the worlds that surrounded and influenced each of us as a child. We have different memories of our past, perhaps, as Carol Ann Duffy’s poem hints – we twist the facts to suit our individual outlooks:

Nobody hurt you.Nobody turned off the light and arguedWith somebody else all-night. The bad man on the moors
Was only a movie you saw. Nobody locked the door. 

Your questions were answered fully. No. That didn’t occur.You couldn’t sing anyway, cared less. The moment’s a blur, a Film FunLaughing itself to death in the coal fire. Anyone’s guess. 

Nobody forced you. You wanted to go that day. Begged. You choseThe dress. Here are the pictures, look at you. Look at us all,Smiling and waving, younger. The whole thing is inside your head. 

What you recall are impressions; we have the facts. We call the tune.The secret police of your childhood were older and wiser than you, biggerThan you. Call back the sound of their voices. Boom. Boom. Boom. 

Nobody sent you away. That was an extra holiday, with peopleYou seemed to like. They were firm, there was nothing to fear.There was none but yourself to blame if it ended in tears. 

What does it matter now? No, no, nobody left the skid marks of sinOn your soul and laid you wide open for Hell. You were loved.Always. We did what was best. We remember your childhood well. 

-       We Remember Your Childhood Well, by Carol Ann Duffy

Chatting with my eldest son yesterday, he commented that he doesn’t think that most people become interesting or exceptional until they have been challenged and even damaged in some way. Certain plants need to undergo fire before their seeds will germinate, such as the Jack Pine or the Giant Redwood, both of which have serotinous cones that remain sealed by resin, until the heat reaches 27 °C, and then the cones burst open releasing the seeds. Other plants, for example Oak trees, require severe cold for about a month for the stratification of the acorns so that they will germinate. In nature, harsh conditions often are required to enable growth. Looking into the childhood of many inspirational people, many of them share a connecting thread of hardship in their formative years:

Bill Clinton had a troubled upbringing with an abusive father who was an alcoholic and violent. In 1960, a 14 year old Bill and his 4 year old brother heard their father yelling at their mother, knowing that he was beating her and unable to take it any more, Bill grabbed a golf club and rushed to his mother’s defence, threatening to beat his father if he ever touched his mother again. It would be easy to assume that Clinton’s childhood influenced his actions in later life. As a politician, Bill Clinton championed the rights of children and families, passing various significant pieces of legislation, including signing the National Child Protection Act in 1993, increasing the number of children being immunised (less than 60% of 2 year olds in America were fully immunised prior to 1992), banning 19 of the most dangerous assault weapons from domestic ownership and he championed the Violence Against Women Act – the first federal initiative to address domestic violence.

Warren Buffet’s older sister Doris is candid about their childhood. Their mother was bi-polar and as a result often unpredictable and at times unpleasant. Doris was the primary target of their mother’s wrath and would frequently be belittled in front of her younger siblings – admonished for being stupid and graceless. However, all three children were always told that what they had done was not good enough. Interestingly, I spent much of my childhood in close proximity to Richard Branson (as our fathers worked and played sport together) – I noticed that Eve, Richard’s mother, was usually disparaging about his efforts saying things like “Is that the best you can manage?” Richard was dyslexic and had a difficult time at school, but he was eager to please people, especially his mother. I often wonder if her frequent criticism, early on in his life, helped give him the drive and determination to succeed on his own.

If childhood impact interests you, you might enjoy Cradles of Eminence - a book by Victor and Mildred Goertzel – in the mid 1960’s they researched and assessed the early experiences of 700 of the world’ most renown and successful individuals (e.g. Freud, Mao, Churchill, Gandhi, Roosevelt, Einstein, etc.…). 525 of the 700 came from deeply troubled childhoods. Most had at least one ambitious parent (many had dominant mothers); almost all disliked school but loved learning. The Goertzel’s concluded that many eminent people were driven by the need to compensate for their disadvantages, which had the result of turning them into over achievers. Clearly, I am not in the “Eminent Individual” category, but I do know that my father’s comment to me that I “have been a disappointment” to him since I was 14 (said to me in my early 30’s) has made me even more determined to plough my own furrow and create my own legacy. Like Bill Clinton, I found myself defending my mother when I was a teenager (and on more than one occasion had a black eye to prove it). I wonder if I my high degree of resilience and determination area due to my having to fight for others. My eldest son says that, in his opinion, since the age of 14 I have always put others before myself, and, by habitually doing so, I have become the person I now am.

I think it started sooner – I was a doted upon only child (my mother had 9 miscarriages before I was born) and, when I survived a very premature arrival, I was cherished. I had a very happy childhood.  I started writing a post about my relationship with my father on the announcement of Leonard McCoy’s death, earlier this year, but, due to a slightly challenging few months, it has taken me to now to finally collect my thoughts. In a way both McCoy and my father influenced me into becoming who I am. One of my happiest memories (and certainly the highlight of my school week, when I was eight) was when my father would come home early from work on a Wednesday evening. He always stopped off at the Chinese takeaway (there was only one near us in those days  - an exotic novelty). He would buy a bag of freshly made prawn crackers, which we would consume religiously, delighting in the crunch and the compelling way in which the snacks stuck to our tongues like Eucharist bread. Every Wednesday we watched the latest episode of Star Trek, which screened at 7.10pm.  Most of my friends loved Kirk, but admired Spock and often used his Vulcan greeting to people at school. Although fictitious, I found the logical, principled approach that the character applied to life pleasing.

With a moral compass and an outlook on life ingrained within me, I had a foundation on which to build when things changed. At the age of 10, when my first sister was born, my mother became ill and she was often bed-bound over the next four years. With little preparation, I found myself bottle-feeding and changing nappies for two little girls, and caring for them, while my parents’ marriage disintegrated around us. 

Me and my two little sisters

The desire to nurture others became deep-rooted. This is not a sob-story; I love my family, am on good terms with almost all of them, and I’m comfortable with who I am. I am grateful to both of my parents for the influence that they have had, like all of us my behavioural traits are deep-rooted and were formed and nurtured by my upbringing. Without my parents I would not be me. And on that note I shall sign off, as I am about to take my father and eldest son out to lunch.

Grandpa and eldest grandson having lunch

My father when a little boy