I’ve never really been a Christmas person. Growing up in south London with a single mother and siblings, I didn’t think of myself as poor because everyone around me was the same. In a pre-digital world, the riches shown on TV were a fantasy no more connected to my life than Grizzly Adams or Lee Majors.
Christmas in our house was low-key: rice and peas, lamb and plantain dinner, and lazing around watching TV. Presents were perfunctory and after 13, they dried up completely. I learned very early that there was lots of great stuff in the world and I was unlikely to own very much of it. I felt about Christmas how I still feel about Valentine’s Day. It meant obligation, debt, guilt, and emoting on demand.
