February must be the most boring month of winter -- well, of the year

really. Apart from pancakes and the tedious leap-year thing

In the second of a series of special essays for Weekender,Marcella

Evaristi finds herself alone on a winter's day in a deep and dark

December.

NOVEMBER 1960

LAST night was Guy Fawkes night and I was very excited, unlike my dog

who was very scared and shivered under the kitchen table. I found this

very strange because he is normally brave and once tried to bite an

Alsatian's bottom. He is a poodle.

All my aunties and uncles and cousins came over to our house and

brought more fireworks. There were stripey rockets with scrunchy blue

paper and loads of my favourites -- the ones that look like wee

upside-down pokey hats. And even bangers which we don't normally get,

but some of my cousins are boys and I've got no brothers so I expect my

parents couldn't be rude.

Before we started Mamma handed out mugs of tomato soup and sausages

and a huge tray as big as a table without any legs. The tray was for her

toffee apples. These are a million times nicer than the red ones you get

in the shops. The Cellophane stuff always takes half the crusty red

toffee off of those, but I like them, too. But her toffee is the actual

colour of toffee. And it's chewy and it not only goes round the apple

but makes a little plate of toffee at the bottom as well.

Other people's fireworks were scooting up already and there was a

lovely smell like matches and coal and frost all mixed up. Daddy went

off to get a hammer for the Catherine Wheels and then everything

happened very quickly and slowly at the same time. First of all my

cousin, Silvio, ran backwards from the box, then Mamma grabbed the hood

of my duffel coat and pulled me.

The box crackled and made little bangs at first, then it went lopsided

and blew up. It wasn't like a cartoon bomb. Colours started fizzing out

and then we were all watching from the kitchen. My auntie was screaming

at Silvio and my dog was barking and then everything went quiet again

apart from a purple bang from the end of next door's garden.

Silvio had dropped a match inside the box and looked really trembly.

He wasn't crying although he was holding his chin up very high.

My Dad said it was an accident and began to laugh. I felt sorry for

Silvio and said at some much worse accidents children went blind,

because I had seen the Guy Fawkes advertisements to be careful on the

television. Mamma stared at the burnt box and said: ''That went as

quickly as the year''.

I don't know what she meant because after November the fifth there's

nothing to look forward to until Christmas and that takes ages and ages.

DECEMBER, BOXING DAY, 1968.

HAVE received a tape recorder for my Christmas and I am beginning to

record my reminiscences. It starts with me saying ''It is my sixteenth

birthday to heaven'' like in the Dylan Thomas poem and then I go on

about my early vivid experiences. Like in the wintertime of my youth

when I was taken to the pantomime and my Mum and Dad knew a lot of

people in the cast cos their Alhambra Cafe was across from the Alhambra

theatre and I was only about five or something.

Larry Marshall came on stage dressed as a nurse in this hospital

sketch and Rikki Fulton in the character of Matron looked across and

said, ''Hey, if it's no' Nurse Marcellina!'' I couldn't believe that my

name (couldn't be a coincidence -- not with my name!!!) was spoken from

a professional stage. The same night I was taken backstage and met Lenny

the Lion who covered his long eyelashes with his paw and said, ''Isn't

she pretty?''

I am convinced these two memories, omens even, have informed my

desperation to try for a career in the theatre.

Everyone has gone for a walk but I feel like being solitary here in my

room with my Paul Simon Songbook. I am playing ''A winter's day -- in a

deep and dark December -- I am alone''. Strange that a stranger can

truly understand you.

I realise I can't remember exactly which pantomime included a hospital

sketch and Lenny the Lion. How quickly one can forget the details. Am

glad I plumped for the tape recorder and not Being and Nothingness by

Jean-Paul Sartre. Though I've heard that it's amazing. Since the

minutiae of our existence can so quickly fade from our consciousness I

will describe my bedroom for posterity. Whenever my parents redecorate I

have to look at my Citizens' Theatre posters. I nearly lost A Day in the

Death of Joe Egg under poppy wallpaper earlier in the year. I will also

recite my favourite sayings that I've got written on my Quotations

Board. Such as ''Love is the sweet delinquesence of the bowels'' penned

by the writer Kingsley Amis.

From my window I can see snow-laden trees, the MacDonalds Hotel and

some youths throwing snowballs. Realise I recognise them. The youths, I

mean. Perhaps some fresh air would be a useful hiatus. Over and out.

DECEMBER 1994

THE MINISTER AND THE CHRISTMAS TREE

AND a certain minister's speech was reported in the press, and thus it

was known how he railed at the godless and atheistic and improper

transformation of this pious time. ''For verily commercialism in all its

aspects has undermined this festival into a carnival of More and

Spend.''

And he railed at the tinsel which glittered like the lure of borrowed

gold. And he spat -- metaphorically -- on that bold, that brazen pagan

artefact the Christmas -- how unaptly named -- the Christmas Tree.

Now it happened that the children of the village heard of his disdain,

and knew as well their parents half agreed.

(Mostly their Mums and Dads had just concurred that this season coiled

them into huge expenditure. But the damage had been done.)

The children, quite exaggerating what they'd eavesdropped, panicked --

and as weans do, they formed a plan.

And so it was on Christmas Eve that night the little ones sneaked out

and each child carried a branch cut from their own trees. What a motley

Birnam wood waved through the snow in a line towards that minister's

abode.

Some brought silver artificial branches with red velvet bows. Some

held pine with baubles -- every type of seasonal dark conifer or plastic

twig that you have ever seen bobbled and swayed as the children made

their way along the road.

When at last they arrived in the minister's front garden you might

have thought a circus troupe had come to town. Like acrobats they jumped

up on each others' shoulders, the strongest on the ground and the

smallest toddler like a fairy wobbling on the top.

For yes, you've guessed it, that Baby Birnam had become a beautiful

tall tree, and unknownst to them, from a nearby roof, a gentleman in red

was watching every swaying move.

''Ho, ho, how wonderful!'' said Santa with a grin. ''When most kiddies

are cuddled up excited waiting with bated breath for me -- these wee

ones brought some old pensioner a tree! You have lifted my heart,'' he

said, with sentimental tear, ''your gorgeous tree has everything but

presents -- here!'' (And threw one down.)

Just then a window opened and a head popped out. ''We wish you Merry

Christmas!'' was the children's shout.

The minister was silent.

Then with trembling voice said ''Would this be mine?''

And now he wears green boxer shorts, signed Calvin Klein.

JANUARY

I HAVE finally located my 1995 diary; it was hiding from me under a

Home Farm set. On the cover of the box there's a farmhouse and fences, a

farmer, a windmill, and a long wall; there's geese and a cockerel,

rabbits, ponies, ducks, and all the animals you would expect. Inside

there's a small transparent plastic bag with two cows, a pig, and

three-quarters of a pen. A colostomy of disappointment. On the side of

the box you can see, with the help of a microscope, the words Colours

and contents may vary from picture shown.

I curl up on the carpet with my diary and settle down to symbolically

begin my New Year. It is the seventh of January. Pine needles have

porcupined my foot. I wait a little, But when no prince appears to

remove them with his perfect teeth, I am not dismayed. I am resilient,

hopeful, and practical.

Under Things to Remember I write Get Hoover fixed. But the resolutions

have to wait until I fill in my personal details. Name, yes, address,

yes, home number, yes. Under business number I write my home number out

again. But in brisker, sort of affluent lettering.

Then my pen hovers above National Insurance number, moves south over

National Health number and passport number, then, stopping briefly over

driving licence number, moves decisively back to Things to Remember and

writes Learn to drive.

I briskly move to my desk and look out of the window. There's been no

snow this year, so the playful boys on the street have been reduced to

throwing stones wrapped round with nothing but their own young fingers.

The man who arrived with his machine to spray away the cockroaches has

been and gone, so under January fourth I write, Phoned hygiene

department.

I notice that Wednesday the first of February, subject to the sighting

of the moon, is the First Day of Ramadan, that Monday the sixth is

Waiting Day in New Zealand, but there's no mention of St Valentine's Day

on the fourteenth.

I rather disapprove of this because what if there's no moon on the

first and you're not giving it what-for in Wellington on the sixth, then

you might forget the only mildly interesting day of the whole month.

Because February must be the most boring month of winter -- well, of the

year really. Apart from pancakes and the tedious leap-year thing. (There

was always a boring old bastard, some acquaintance of your parents,

betting you a 10 shilling note he really was 11.)

Beside February thirteenth, I write Remember ST VD seven thirty am

tomorrow in squashed-up handwriting so that it will look, should anyone

glance at my diary beside the phone, as if I had breakfast business

meetings whilst self-deluding lovelorn women listened out for postie

from behind their own front doors.

Suddenly I realise that I am being winked at. Under hygiene department

I write, At least four hours a day no stinting no matter what, and

putting down my pen I move to the flickering word processor and press

the button for Create A New Document. I type the title, On Princes and

Disclaimers, then, after a small hiatus, I put Paul Simon on and light a

fag.