Brianna Parkins: Don’t let matching pyjama photos on social media convince you otherwise. The perfect Christmas is a myth

I am on a self-imposed ban from telling dinner party anecdotes. The kind that start with someone talking about a bad date they had which kicks off a story telling round, where guests go around the table sharing about the time they were catfished, or they found someone’s mother already sitting at the restaurant table, or was introduced by a stranger as “my girlfriend” on the first date.

We find it comforting, to know other people also have bad experiences. This could be because social media only shows us the exfoliated parts of people’s lives, leading us to believe everyone is only ever having the best time and it’s just us stuffing it all up. Or it could be because deep down we’re just terrible people and enjoy it when things go wrong for others. Either way, it all makes us feel less alone.

My problem started when, over a table set with Ikea candles and a bottle of the second cheapest red from M&S, we were asked to talk about our funniest memory of Christmas gone wrong. Everyone has one because no one has a perfect Christmas every year, despite what we irrationally tell ourselves. The John Lewis ad makes us cry for a reason. It’s a weird calendar period full of the dual evils of expectations and comparisons to others. Presents, get togethers, stressful to-do lists and “this time last year” Facebook reminders act like emotional dragnets, bringing up all the stuff that’s been lying on the ocean floor of our hearts all year - grief, addiction struggles, loneliness, insecurity, jealousy, feeling taken for granted, disappointment, anxiety, numbness. All the fun ones. The gang’s all here.

This is why on Christmas Day it is considered perfectly normal behaviour to pour Baileys on your cereal instead of milk.

Top recipes of 2023: The dishes you savoured most from our food writers this year

---

Tesco’s share of Christmas grocery trade rises to a quarter, highest since 2015

---

TV guide: 12 of the best new shows to watch

---

Your gardening questions answered: How to compost a Christmas tree

---

[ Brianna Parkins: Bin the pre-Christmas meet-up – and these other festive atrocities ]

[ Brianna Parkins: There should be no moral superiority assigned to different types of addiction ]

So I told the story about the Christmas when some members of my family left lunch to do class-A drugs. The kind that can either be smoked or injected. They had a whispered debate about where they would conduct this unorthodox Christmas activity, given we were having a family picnic in a park (it was summer in Australia, for context). In the end they decided on the tried and true method usually favoured by drunk girls dying for a wee on a night out and went behind a parked car.

There was one small detail they had overlooked in this plan. They had pulled crackers that day (adhering to the family rule of not cheating by using a banned type of grip) and were still wearing the customary coloured paper crowns. Which unfortunately for them meant the little tips of green and red made them quite conspicuous over the top of the car they were attempting to crouch behind. The part of this story that always gets me was that before this they had talked about making sure they would have a piece of Nan’s specially prepared pudding, as if refusing her cooking might upset her more than her loved ones doing serious drugs in the carpark on Christmas Day. Looking back, I appreciate the effort they took to mind her feelings, and how the “don’t upset Nanna” rule over-rides even if we’re struggling with addiction. For me, the story reminds me of the messy love families have for each other.

If life has taught me anything, everyone has their own sh*t. We just don’t know about it

After I’d told the story at the dinner party, I realised I had misjudged the audience badly. Their stories turned out to be the “oh we burnt the turkey and had to have the backup roast chicken” kind of vibe. Not the tragi-comic “if you don’t laugh, you’ll cry” story I had. I immediately went into “why did I say that?!” mode on the drive home, swearing a vow of silence for the next year because I’m a social freak who shouldn’t say anything unscripted.

But the truth is, that’s what happened. Now that some of those people have passed and won’t be at any Christmas again, I hold on to the memory with a sort of fondness. They’re my memories, my family and no one can take that away. We have had all kinds of Christmases together over the years - some picture perfect, some tricky and some a normal mixture of both. But they’re our Christmases.

It’s tempting to envy families who have Christmas in big houses with tasteful fir garlands, drinking real Champagne instead of prosecco and playing board games that don’t end with the table flipped over. But if life has taught me anything, everyone has their own sh*t. We just don’t know about it. Those families with Insta photos with matching pyjamas under their six foot tree may have just had a blazing row about the credit card bill before they snapped the pic. Personally, the best Christmases I’ve spent are under a €15 Aldi fan with my cousins and family as kids in a suburban living room on a 40 degree day. I just didn’t realise it until they were gone.

It’s okay to have a Christmas that Hallmark wouldn’t make a movie about. It’s okay not to be bothered with the whole thing at all. Maybe you’ve lost someone and can’t face it yet. Maybe it reminds you of bad memories or tricky family situations. The only present you have to worry about is the gift of minding yourself.