One Christmas was so much like another in those years, to borrow a line from Dylan Thomas. Mother, who celebrated every feast day with aplomb – Shrove Tuesday with specially prepared pancakes, Halloween with monkey nuts (peanuts in the shell), bobbing for apples, and Barmbrack – saved her most elaborate plans for Christmas. And I do mean saved. We had a farm but money was far from plentiful, and looking back I don’t know how she managed to pull it all together – how she always made the best of things.
Christmas was magic and that magic was mother.
The preparations began in late autumn. The plum pudding was made, stirred a final time for good luck, then tied in gauze and seamed in a bowl on top of the wood-burning Stanley stove. The big square Christmas cake, heavy with fruit, raisins sultanas, and glacé cherries, was baked until it was golden brown. In the weeks ahead it would be doused with whiskey to keep it moist. Closer to Christmas it was covered with almond paste, which required a lot of kneading and rolling to get to the right thickness, and two days later the white icing would be applied using a spoon to raise the icing into little peaks to give it a snow effect.
In the weeks leading up to Christmas, the excitement would build. The annual letter was written to Santa, and each child got to request the present we wanted. Christmas cards would arrive from relatives in America, England, Australia, and from my mother’s friend Pat in South Africa. Dad’s cousins in Birmingham always sent a parcel full of goodies. The cry would go up, “The McCarthys’ parcel has arrived!” Auntie Breda, who lived in Hawaii, always sent a Christmas photo of her and Uncle Tom, son, Patrick, and daughter, Maureen, with palm trees in the background – sending sunshine our way.
Part of the Christmas ritual for us kids was the annual trip to Todds Department Store in Limerick city (30 miles away) for a photograph with Santa. Since it was the same Santa year after year, we had no trouble believing he was authentic.
Midnight mass was another ritual. On Christmas Eve, we all piled into the car for the trip to town to the Church of St. Mary of the Rosary. Mother drove. Dad stayed at home with the babies. I still remember the crunch of feet on frosty gravel as we made our way to the car, and how we avoided looking in the window of the front room (where the Christmas tree took up much of the Bay window) in case Santa (we always called him Santy) was early. Mass was magnificent; the choir, the Latin, the Nativity Scene, and best of all, the anticipation of what was to come.
Santa always came while we were at mass. The Guinness bottle and biscuit plate that we’d left out for him, empty behind him. The first thing to do when we got home was to put the statue of the baby Jesus in the crib (the Wise Men wouldn’t go in until January 6). Then we were allowed to open our stockings, which usually held an orange, banana, chocolate, and some little presents – once I got a yellow chicken that actually laid white plastic eggs. The big presents under the tree had to wait until morning to be opened.
Christmas dinner was a feast. My mother would get up in the early morning to put the large turkey in the oven. It would cook slowly and was basted on the hour until the skin was brown and crispy and the meat just fell off the bone. The table was laid in the good room we called the Drawing Room. There was a fire burning in the grate and a Christmas cracker at every place. Brussels sprouts (which we only ate once a year!) and a carrot parsnip mix mashed with plenty of butter and roast potatoes were served as side dishes. Dessert was sherry trifle and plum pudding.
In the evening, visitors would arrive and sit around the fire, and the women would drink port or sherry, and the men would have ‘a small one.’ Auntie Josie would sing “Oh for the Days of the Kerry Dances,” hitting all the high notes. Mother would recite a poem that went like this, “Sayin’ I will and I must get married for the humor is on me now. Oh, the humor is on me now.” Dad would sing, “The Little Shirt my Mother Made for me,” and “Galway Bay,” and Uncle Liam, if he and the family were home from London, would sing “I’ll Take you Home again, Kathleen,” which was always a little sad because he and his wife, Kathleen, and our cousins would soon be going away again, back to England. But it really was a magical time of story and song, good food and laughter, and our mother ran the show.
Merry Christmas to all Irish America readers, especially to all the big Irish families who will gather together to celebrate. At the time of writing (2002), mother was living in San Francisco, still baking Christmas cakes, steaming plum puddings, and saving her pension money to buy presents for her many American grandchildren. She passed on New Year’s Eve 2008 at 89, and while she is greatly missed, we are grateful for all that she gave us and taught us . ♣
– Patricia Harty
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