A Village Christmas
Notes on seasonal living, daily joys and Laurie Lee
Christmas in the country meant feasts and fires, a few brief days of excess, when even the poorest among us would confront the stern gods of winter with the bravest possible show of good living.”
Laurie Lee, Village Christmas
My friend Kate always gives the very best literary recommendations, none more so than the mesmerisingly beautiful Village Christmas: And Other Notes on the English Year by Laurie Lee. Ever since she recommended it to me last December, I have garnered endless festive joy from its pages; but it is only since moving to our own cottage in the English countryside that I have truly appreciated Lee’s lyrical depictions of seasonal village living in all their glory.
It’s no secret that of all the seasons, the bracing English winter has my heart, but even I could never have anticipated how keenly the seasons are felt (and celebrated) when you live in a village in the middle of the East Sussex countryside. The frozen, muddy, rosy-cheeked remnants of winter will soon give way to new buds sprung from the very ground on which we walk every day: almost as soon as the snowdrops and daffodils rear their heads, summer will make herself known, bringing golden warmth and lush greenery until the leaves turn brown.
In the country, any opportunity to gather as a community is taken with both hands and squeezed of all its joyous potential, and this year’s village Christmas lights switch on was no exception. Our two families came together to celebrate the coming of the festive season; the torches were lit, the children’s choir singing gayly in the square as proud parents looked on. At the countdown, the village came alive with twinkling lights, the warmth and community spirit of that moment enveloping us all on a cold December night. As I watched the people we love most in the world whooping and cheering, torches aloft, my heart swelled.
“Night came early, with the valley and its woods closing in darkly around the house. Now was the time to light the tree, its branches loaded with tinsel, with silver cut-out moons and stars, and with the clip-on candles, each a living tongue of flame, building up a pyramid of dancing light.”
Seasonal living is purposeful living. For me, moving to a place that is formed and altered by the elements, the trees bearing every mark and shift in the passing seasons, has made me evermore aware of how I feel. When I step out into the bitter cold, scarf wrapped tightly around my neck as I pull on my gloves and lace up my walking boots, I am nowhere except in my body. I am watching my breath cloud in front of me, nodding my head at passing dog walkers, dodging icy puddles, striding up and up and up into the boggy woods and then emerging, victorious and rosy-cheeked, into the field. My desk is someplace else. Right here, in this field, I am just a woman walking.
In the few weeks that we have lived here, I have found such solace in being part of a community that could not care less about what I do for a job. I love my work, but I also crave the quiet magic of home and family: a cosy trip to the local cinema that I used to visit as a child, a home-cooked roast dinner, an evening spent decorating the Christmas tree with ornaments collected and carefully preserved over the decades.
A village Christmas, a village life, I have learnt, is one spent revelling in the joy of the every day.
“Only one colour remains, today’s single promise, pricked in red over the ashen world - seen in a flitting robin, some rosehips on a bush, the sun hanging low by the wood, and through the flushed cottage windows the berries of holly and the russet faces of the feasting children. It is good to have been walking on such a day, feeling the stove of one’s body alive, to be walking in winter on the ground of one’s birth, and good to be walking home.”
Thank you so much for reading this post, and if you haven’t read Village Christmas by Laurie Lee, I highly, highly recommend it! Pop it on your reading list for those strange few days in-between Christmas and New Year - you won’t regret it.
Lauren x
So pleased to have found your Substack - this is exactly the kind of writing I enjoy, good job 🙌🏻 (adding A Village Christmas to my reading list!)
Oh this is such a lovely, warming read!! I hope to move to Scotland at some point in my life for this very reason - I want the elements to have full control!