Christmas wouldn't be the same without …

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/dec/24/christmas-wouldnt-be-same-without-traditions

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David Shariatmadari

There are two ways of coping with being the youngest sibling. One is to indulge your baby-of-the-family status. You suck your thumb longer than your brother and sister did and throw a tantrum when your buggy is finally wheeled on to the scrapheap. The other is to deny that you were ever a baby in the first place. You never get caught watching TV that's too young for you and you don't show how excited you are about stupid things like opening presents.

I'm pretty sure I bounced between big baby and wannabe adult depending on my mood. Christmas, however, was when I had to practise the grown-up skill of delayed gratification.

Rushing down to open presents first thing in the morning is just not the done thing in our house. Instead we have a weird ritual, despite being neither religious nor monarchists: there is no opening of presents until after the national anthem is played at the end of the Queen's speech. Even then no one makes a move towards the pile at the bottom of the tree for fear of seeming too eager. But, having practised restraint all day, this is when I buckle. The pleasure (and occasionally disappointment) is all the greater, of course, for having waited. It might seem Scrooge-like but it's a good lesson to learn.

This Christmas, for the first time in 36 years, I am no longer the baby of my family. My new niece won't be opening presents herself for another year or two. But despite enduring years of nervous anticipation, my advice to her will still be to wait until that creaky smile passes across the monarch's lips. Delayed gratification is all the sweeter.

Paula Cocozza

The difficulty with traditions is that they are by their nature binding. "But it isn't Christmas without …" is something I say a lot at this time of year. It sometimes ends in Turkish delight. Roast beef. Chestnuts. Dubonnet: my first Christmas drink, aged about 12, and still for me the height of sophistication, even when drunk with lemonade. Also those little orange and lemon segments. The best ones are laid out like an orange, peeled and shot from above. Although the truth is they taste only of citric jellied sugar, with a lovely coating of … sugar. They used to be everywhere when I was small, but these days are most easily found in the cheap shops: I can't think why.

I am not adverse to trying new things, but if they are good they will probably have to become a tradition, too. Sometimes, ploughing through all of the traditions is a bit of a slog. Especially if they are not other people's, and you have to uphold them all yourself. Not finishing an edible tradition feels like a betrayal and threatens to undo years of loyalty. Perhaps that's why towards 5pm all these rituals begin to weigh you down. Although I am too busy to adopt it myself, I can see why some people like the tradition of a post-lunch walk.

Hugh Muir

There will be discussion on Boxing Day about the number of Christmas television repeats. People will talk about the Queen's speech and whether the special edition of Downton Abbey was as dramatic as had been anticipated. All of this will pass me by.

The only Christmas TV I'm interested occurs at night. This is when the turkey-induced stupor has set in, everyone else has gone to bed, and I settle down – nestling a glass of rum, cradling a box of chocolates – to watch the themed late night films. It might be a series of Humphrey Bogart classics. Or Clint Eastwood. In days better than this it was always the Marx Brothers on BBC2. The musical numbers dragged on a bit, but Groucho's zingers always seemed funnier when everyone else was asleep.

Over the years my reliance on TV schedulers to provide an appropriately themed series of old films has receded. Hence the series of Bill Murray films I bought on DVD this week. Bill is my Christmas contingency.

John Crace

The instructions were always quite clear. Our two children weren't allowed to come into our bedroom to open their stockings until 7am because it would make Santa unhappy. In the early years this was a bit hit and miss despite signs posted in their bedroom informing them what 7am looked like on a clock face. Santa was frequently pissed off. There then came a few years of comparative calm when the system worked well. A few giggles outside the door at 6.55am but basically Santa was cool with that.

As the children grew older, the stocking opening time got pushed back a bit. "How about we make it 8am," the children would say. "We're going to be up late". Santa was thrilled. Now 8am has moved to 9am, with the kids saying: "We'll have only got home by 3. Wake us up if we're not with you by 9.30." But still they lumber in with their stockings and it is the first ritual of Christmas Day that we all sit in bed together opening our presents.

The bed is still the same size as it was. Our daughter is now 22 and our son 19. Both are over 6ft. The dog also now insists on climbing on to the bed even though he doesn't have a stocking. It is more than a tight squeeze. It is an impossible squeeze and more often than not I am half out the bed with one foot on the floor for balance. Santa isn't too sure how he feels about that.

Holly Baxter

For me, Christmas means the annual traipse around a number of different houses in search of my various siblings and parental figures. Both of my parents have been divorced, twice, taking on stepchildren and producing their own kids along the way, so there are now four of us who all have different sets of parents and all have to coordinate our Christmas celebrations accordingly. I've found that it's easiest to spend Christmas morning at my dad's, move to my mum's wider family in the afternoon, and then try to visit a pub they all live nearby in the evening. Now that one of my sisters has a baby, the routine has become even more complicated.

Christmas was always tinged with sadness for me as a child, as I usually spent Christmas Day with my mum and Boxing Day with my dad. Christmas Day would inevitably involve a heart-wrenching phone call from my father, telling me how much he wished I was there instead. And then, while everyone else was hitting the sales on Boxing Day or relaxing in front of the TV, I was getting up early, ready to travel to where my dad and his family lived.

Sentimentality about Christmas doesn't go well with my kind of family set-up; once you stop believing that your family should resemble the nuclear unit smiling away in the background of the John Lewis advert you can start to enjoy December with them as the lovably dysfunctional group that they really are.

Anne Perkins

The tree has to come from Buster, up the hill. He has a small patch of ground where he grows them, somehow producing a crop of about 50 in varying sizes for the December trade. Early in the month we walk up to his yard and collect a piece of paper, a plastic bag and a piece of string to label our tree. Then we plunge into the mud and brambles, avoiding his very free range hens, to make our choice. Buster's planting is quite random, and the tree has to be carefully examined in the round, since quite often one has grown into its neighbour and wouldn't necessarily meet the standards of the Christmas tree inspectors. Fortunately it is more important that it is tall and fat for at least three quarters of its circumference (it stands in a corner) in order to hold the extensive range of baubles collected since the children were first making stars from cereal packets and silver foil. Sometime before Christmas Eve, Buster chops it down and in an act of neighbourly generosity delivers it so decoration can commence – altogether another Christmas ritual.

George Monbiot

Every year, beginning on Boxing Day, about 20 of us struggle on horseback over the carcass of a goat. The game is called buzkashi. It generally lasts for three or four days, after which it takes about a week to recover.

In my dreams. No, in reality I do what everyone else does: eating, drinking, visiting and giving presents. The children love it, and that is how it should be: this is their festival. But should there not also be a few days every year when adults can go berserk?

Most cultures have developed rituals for releasing the beast within. We have them too: rugby and hunting are examples. I've sought to shake off the frustrations of my ordered and humdrum life in my sea kayak, or by walking in the hills. It helps, but there's still something missing, something I found in the raves and protests of the 1990s: going nuts in good company. The closest people seem to get these days is elbowing other shoppers in the face to buy junk on Black Friday. There has to be a better way.