Caroline O'Donoghue: Three crap Christmases
I recently read Mariah Carey’s autobiography. In it, Carey reveals how horrible her childhood Christmases tended to be. How her split family would come together, and the results would be intense bickering that could sometimes lead to violence. How, as the youngest, she felt powerless to stop anything that was happening. How she really didn’t want a lot for Christmas, there was just one thing she needed, and it was not to have dinner interrupted by the police. She ends the segment with “people put too much pressure on Christmas".
All my life, I’ve been frantically queuing up on December 23rd, trying to justify a Jamie Oliver branded egg cup as a suitable present for my mother, listening to as it blasts through a department store speaker. Even the woman who soundtracks our highly pressurised Christmas believes that too much pressure is put on Christmas.
