As I stared out of a large single window the light was dying slowly in a great gleam without colour, framed rigidly in the gathering shades of the room.
Katie O`Hara
As I stared out of a large single window the light was dying slowly in a great gleam without colour, framed rigidly in the gathering shades of the room. I was staring at hard at a leaf, dangling from a twig, its stalk torn across by the wind. Only the green tough skin of the stalk, held suspended. As the leaf reminded me, I would never see the green trees shed there leaves again and nor could I once again be a part of the tree. In the distance I can see the evergreens bent from a hard night of snow, there branches glistening in the twilight sky. A cold wind howls in the distance rattling against my window, winter used to bring hope, where we used to spent hours around the warmth of the fire, now winter brings solitude and once again I am reminded that I may never see the freshly fallen snow under a fall moon or the children laugh as they make a snowman as I once did. The room smelt of disinfectant, making me nauseas and queasy, and I couldn’t help but think back to the childhood Christmas I spent happily with my family, as I stared into my uneasy and complicated future.
They say that your conscious will catch you up in later life, but for me it is not my conscience that haunts me, but the fact that there are so many mistakes I’ve made, so many decisions I have made wrongly and maybe if I was to go back in time, I wouldn’t be here now contemplating my future across a blanket of white snow. When I look back to my carefree childhood, I remember that winter was always a happy and joyful time, especially around Christmas. Mum would go crazy, she adored Christmas and everything was huge! Maybe this was her way of dealing with the poverty she endured as a child; I guess Christmas wasn’t a happy time in her family. There was this one Christmas I remember like it was yesterday, there was never any chance of Christmas being quiet in our house with 3 teenage girls and mum going mad at dad because he promised to wrap the presents but he forgot. Then dad went down the pub and came drunk, and everything was very hectic. Of course Christmas was a very special and unique time, the house always smelt fresh and pleasant with a hint of nutmeg and other herbs. Come bedtime, it was impossible to get to sleep with all the excitement and enthusiasm for the next day to arrive, Mum would call up and shout at regular intervals for us to quieten down, and as time went on she got madder and madder, until her and dad went to sleep themselves. The next day we awoke to find the presents bulging from our sacks that we had carefully placed out on our beds the night before. We hurried and began ripping the paper from our presents. Paper flying everywhere. When my sister, who happens to be a size 14 rugby player received a size 8 thong, we were all a bit surprised to say the least, we were bursting with laughter when Mum and Dad stormed in to find my sister parading around the room with a pink thong on top of her pyjamas, no one had to even try and guess what had happened. Once Mum had finally convinced drunk Dad to wrap up the presents he had only got my two sisters stockings mixed up! Why was no one surprised? As mum and dad argued crunching over the screwed up wrapping paper, that covered the whole of the carpet floor, a typical Christmas at our house full of laughter and fun.
