A time of year that it’s hard to make up your mind about

Country Living with Francis Farragher

It’s about time I found out now but I’ve never really quite figured whether I like Christmas or not. Truth to tell, I’ve haven’t forgiven Santa Claus either for making that irrevocable decision that I was too old to qualify for presents when I reached the 11 or 12 age mark (a bit younger now I suspect), but decide he did, and since then, things have never quite been the same.

Even in the good times with Santa, there wasn’t a minute’s comfort with him, as I was never quite sure on the run-up to Christmas as to whether my good deeds had out-done my bad ones. As a child, just to be on the safe side, I always said a few nightly prayers in December to try and balance the books. In fairness to the old man from the North Pole, he never did let me down, until I got too big for my boots, and decided that I didn’t need him anymore.

Since then, I’ve scurried about to try and find some little consolations from our mid-winter celebration of all things holy, and at times unholy too, but often it can be a predicament too far.

However, one definite positive has to be that Christmas for all its joys, faults and failures, does give us at least a little break from all the greyness and gloom of a winter season, where the short supply of natural daylight does seem to get us all down a bit. It’s because of this darkness that we can appreciate so much that mini-universe of Christmas lights of all shapes, sizes and colours.

Now, in case that you think I’m leading you on a little trip of optimism and hope, there are also those feelings of being trapped in shop aisles holding bags for someone who never seems to come back while passersby seems to give you shoulders and elbows like Meath footballers of old, when they were tough enough to beat the likes of Dublin in Croke Park.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App

Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.

Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.

Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite  HERE.

Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play