Strawberry Christmas

There is a joke in our house this year. We go to the farmer’s market each Saturday morning and choose basketfuls of fresh summer produce—perfect strawberries and raspberries, fresh juicy peaches, tiny plumbs that look just like cherries. We pass by the Christmas decorations with our arms laden with fruit and sigh, “Nothing says Christmas like strawberry season!” And we eat all the raspberries in the car on our way home and try not to stain our shorts with their juices.

We are seasonally challenged right now. Unlike last year, where it was unseasonably cold here and unseasonably warm in the US, this year the seasons seem to be right for the hemisphere. Which for us feels totally wrong. On Sunday afternoon—12 days before Christmas—I stretched out on steaming hot sand and listened to the waves pound. Then, hot enough, I ran into the cold sea, jumping waves with Aidan and then floating, my purpled toes breaking the surface of the water.

And it’s not just the weather, it’s the light. Here the sun is well up by 5ish and the sky is still fully light at 9pm. They have to schedule Christmas light excursions at 10:30! Our pathetic Christmas tree—now relegated to the back lounge because I couldn’t stand to look at it each day in the front lounge—sits without its lights on most of the time because it’s simply too bright outside to bother.

If this sounds like utter bliss, it’s only because it IS utter bliss. But there are worries too. The biggest worry is that I cannot get my head to believe that it’s Christmas. I cannot get my act together to buy and ship presents overseas (look for gifts in the New Year, Dad). I cannot make a Christmas list and check it twice. I cannot bake gingerbread houses for my children to decorate. I mean, I have to be at the beach! And would you pick gingerbread or the strawberry shortcake I made last night for dessert—I mean, seriously!

Sometimes, though, it seems like Christmas is perfect in the summer. I know it’s a solstice holiday and the lights bring comfort during the coldest and darkest days of winter. But it’s also a family holiday and a time for masses of people to gather together and spend time together. Here, folks set up tents in their lawn for out of town guests. Here you throw Christmas dinner on the barbeque and take a picnic to the beach. Here you can stay up late on New Years eve because it’s only dark for a couple of hours before midnight anyway. So while it’s surreal, it’s the kind of surreal I could get used to over time, I think!

Michael went to a holiday party the other day where there were heaps of strawberries on the table. “Nothing says Christmas like strawberry season!” he joked. A colleague looked at him with a distant smile on her face. “That’s what my mother always used to say,” she said happily, biting into a rich red Christmas berry.

PS In the 24 hours since I’ve written this, the weather has turned cold and nasty and feels seasonally Christmas weather. “Look at this weather!” my cab driver said in disgust today. “You’d think it was the middle of July!” Indeed. Exactly what I was thinking myself…