A Message at Christmas

I spend a lot of my time sorting my life into boxes. Fears, doubts, desires, memories, triumphs, hopes and aspirations all get tucked away in my head so I don't have to face them. It makes for an insular life in many ways but it also means I cope.

Emotions are something I long for and fear in equal proportions. The freedom to let go is something I cannot do - I dare not do - and Christmas is a time when I find it hard to subdue emotion. I guess I'm old-fashioned enough to still love the traditional Christmas of my childhood with carols and the story of the Nativity guaranteed to bring those dreaded emotions to the surface. Silent Night will invariably reduce me to tears and, along with the emotion caused by such memories, is a sense of something lost. Not lost as in no longer here but lost as in missing from my life. It's not a new feeling and has been there for many years but Christmas brings it to the fore, once more.

Maybe Christmas encourages a sense of belonging and that's something from which I shy away? Belonging means being accepted and being accepted means  belonging - something of which I don't feel worthy. That's not something which needs sympathy or reassurance so please don't offer it - it's part of me, for better or for worse and I absorb it and adapt accordingly. It'll never beat me either because there will always be that spark which says "never give up".

This Christmas is tinged with an awful sadness which must remain  private but makes it that little bit harder to keep the boxes locked. Equally, this year I have found even more people for whom I care and who care for me. To them, and all of you who have supported me in my photography and in my life, may I wish you a most wonderful Christmas and a year ahead full of peace and love, where your dreams become realities and your fears become the dust of history.