Every year Lena always managed to find a new man. She never failed. Sometimes it was a friend’s husband, sometimes one of the guys at work. To be honest, once or twice I didn’t have a clue where she found them. For all I knew, she might have propositioned complete strangers in the street. But that was Lena.  Fearless, persuasive, charming. Who was going to turn her down, especially when she offered them the uniform and all the gear? You see, Lena loved her Swedish traditions. And this, she taught us, was the Swedish way.

On December 24^th, just as night was falling, the phone would ring and Lena took the call in the kitchen. Meanwhile our three kids, still pre-teens then, bounced up and down on the sofa, hugging cushions, falling all over one another in their giddy excitement.

— He’s coming. He’s coming. 

— I think I can hear him outside.

— No, he’s talking to Mamma on the phone first. He always does.

He always did. It was part of the script. I had my lines too:

— I don’t think he’ll come this year. None of you have been good enough. Maybe we’ll have to wait till  next year.

— No Pappa, that’s what you always say, but he’s coming. Def’n-italy. He’ll be here in a minute.

And sure enough, after a few more chaotic minutes, we’d hear the cowbell clanging in the garden, the knock at the door, and the trademark Ho-Ho-Ho! 

Christmas had arrived. The children froze, now sitting bolt upright on the sofa, knees together, hands clasped in their laps, sucking in their cheeks to hide their smiles, brimful of anticipation.

— Are there any GOOD CHILDREN HERE?

Tomten — for that’s who it was, our Swedish Santa — boomed out the question. Lena had coached this year’s man well. But did he really need to ask? Just look at them. These three delightful, well-mannered children. Of course they’d been good all year.

So the ritual began. First it was time for the adults to have some fun.

— Have you come far, Tomten?

— Very far. All the way from Sweden.

— From Sweden? You must be exhausted.

— Exhausted, yes. And hot. If I’d known it was going to be this hot in Jeddah, I’d have worn something a little more seasonal. And left the reindeer at home. I should have come by camel. 

— Well, thank you for coming, Tomten. Here’s a chair for you if you’d like to sit down and rest for a while.

— Thank you. Now, let me see, why was it I came here? Let me think.

The kids exchanged glances. Who was going to be brave and remind him? Edwin of course, as the oldest.

— Something in your sack?

— Oh yes, that was it. Let me see if there’s something in my sack for anyone here? Do we have someone called … Josie?

Josie stood up shyly, smoothing the creases out of the special Christmas dress Lena had made for her, identical to little Annelie’s, and she tiptoed across to take the parcel Tomten was holding out.

— There you are Josie. This one’s for you. Merry Christmas.

But standing there with her present, Josie didn’t know what to do next. Should she turn now and just go back to the sofa or … what?

— What do you say to Tomten, Josie?

— Oh. Thank you.

And then she did go back to the sofa, still unsure about whether it was OK to start unwrapping already.

No such qualms with our 4-year-old though. When Annelie’s name was called, she marched straight up to Tomten, grabbed her present, said her thank-yous, and immediately started ripping the wrapping-paper off. So now Josie could follow suit — in her own style, a little more opening than ripping.

After little gifts from the sack for everyone, it was payback time. The kids presented Tomten with a beautifully wrapped and ribboned bottle of something — in alcohol-arid Jeddah it would have been Lena’s home-made wine. And with that, it was goodbye for another year. Tomten slowly hoisted his aged body out of the chair, warned the children of dire consequences if they weren’t good next year, and started making his way back to the reindeer — who he’d left at some filling station or other, he said.

— Don’t forget your porridge, Tomten!

There always had to be a bowl of cold porridge left for him at the front door. Apparently, according to Lena, some terrible tragedy would befall the house if we ever forgot Tomten’s porridge. It was always me who snuck out to empty the bowl though, before the kids could notice. I didn’t eat the stuff.

So that was our tradition. Why did Lena have to find a new man every year? She said it was so the kids wouldn’t recognise the real-life person behind the beard. I suspect she might just have enjoyed the challenge though. And also, it became one of Lena’s traditions. I’ve never been quite sure which were Swedish traditions and which were Lena’s additions. I loved them all though. So did the kids. And how could we stop?

In later years, I think Lena might have forgotten to mention to the strangers she cajoled into the job that our beautiful children were now 20 and 18 and 13. It was always amusing to see the look on Tomten’s face as he came through the front door and into the room. Was this some kind of set-up? Not at all.  The children all fervently believed in Tomten (they assured us), even if he didn’t believe in the children.

I suspect that Edwin might still believe today.

Tomten just made an appearance for 20 minutes. But Lena was our spirit of Christmas — the Queen of Christmas — for the whole month of December. 

First she made the Advent Calendar, hung from the ceiling, little chocolate goodies numbered for each day of the month, tied with strings coloured for each child. 

Then there were preparations for the Lucia festival in mid-month; everywhere we went, Lena found a Swedish community where the children processed in white robes and pointy hats (think Ku Klux Klan without the extremism or hatred). They carried candles and some of the taller boys, incongruously, wore gingerbread-man outfits. All sang songs to celebrate the short life before martyrdom of Saint Lucia on the shortest day of the year. And then we ate lyssebullar, little figure-of-eight-shaped spiced buns, flavoured with saffron and dotted with two raisins — always two raisins for each bun.

The tree needed to be sourced, and of course Lena’s tree had to be real. She suffered for a few years in Saudi Arabia where retail items even faintly suggestive of  Christian decadence, like Barbie packaging and Christmas trees, were banned. We bought a plastic tree from our favourite black marketeer (‘Hey, mister, want to buy a special tree? Come here to back room.’) It was already sad and sparse and joyless when we got it home. But we always surrounded our tree with presents and immediately after Tomten left, we spent the whole evening gathered around it together, handing out the parcels one at a time, sharing the joy together. It didn’t really matter what the gifts were. Yes, it was special to get a new doll, or a bike, or roller blades. But Julafton — Christmas Eve — was special even when the kids packaged up some of my old clothes to re-gift me, or when I gave Lena a sprout. Even our Saudi plastic tree seemed to spruce up.

And then there was the food. The days of preparation for the Julbord — the Christmas table — overladen with Swedish specialities. For starters, spiced varieties of sill (pickled herring), potatoes with dill, eggs devilled with Swedish caviar, limpa (a beery rye-bread) with cheese, Jarlsberg or Edam (chosen for its cheery red rind rather than its taste). Then the main course. Choose between gravlax (cured salmon with a mustard sauce) or meatballs in a cream sauce. Maybe ribs cooked in allspice. Or the ham. Or Janssons Frestelse – truly Swedish, with anchovies and onions in a cream sauce, layered between grated potatoes and baked with a crunchy breadcrumb topping. Or maybe don’t choose — just take them all. For dessert — have you got room for dessert? — ris ala malta, a super-creamy cinnamon-flavoured rice pudding served cold, infused with mandarin pieces. All washed down with Julmust, the Swedish version of Cola, for the kids, and beer for the adults … with snaps (flavoured vodka), downed in one for the occasional toast.

That was the midday meal on December 24^th. It all had to be finished and cleared away before Tomten’s arrival. With Lena supervising, it always was.

So then what was left for the 25^th — Christmas Day? Well, we’re a multicultural family. It was always important for me to raise my kids with an understanding of our British traditions too. Except that compared with the Swedes — or at least, compared with Lena — we don’t seem to have many. And the ones we do have somehow seem, well … a little drab. But I did my best with Christmas dinner.

I made my Christmas pudding a few weeks before, getting the kids involved in the stir-up stage. I told them about the shiny silver sixpence that they might be lucky enough to find hidden inside the pudding. But they called my bluff.

— So what can we do with this shiny silver sixpence, Pop?

— … You could … um … give it back to me … And then I can hide it for you again next Christmas.

I knew it was a feeble response. They knew it too. And nothing I did kindled any kind of enthusiasm for English Christmas dinner, neither my pudding nor my turkey, nor my sprouts nor my roast potatoes. The only exception was the roast parsnips.  They got a thumbs-up from the kids, I guess for being a bit out of the ordinary. A bit exotic. Though not Swedish.

But while the kids only picked and prodded at my Christmas dinner, Lena made me feel better, assuring me that everything was wonderful. 

Although, come to think of it, no matter what food was in front of Lena, she always loved it.

Christmas 2013

It had been a while since the whole family had been together for Christmas. 2006 was the last time I think, before we all gradually left the Middle East, one by one, and headed back to England. The children had all gone their separate ways, following their own dreams. We might see one, sometimes two of them at Christmas, but never the whole collection.

But everything changed in 2013 when we bought our first house in the UK since the early 1990s. It was in Salford, just twenty minutes away from the centre of Manchester by bus or tram. A place that was in such bad shape and in such a run-down area, we could afford to buy it outright. But a place with potential. Large enough too for all three children to move back in, if they ever felt they needed to.

And that’s exactly what they did, as the year passed. They moved back in. And at Christmas, it was almost like old times, celebrating together. God Jul.

Except that this year, there was no Tomten. Well of course not, now the children were all grown up. 

Nobody said it, but we also knew that Lena was in no shape to go and find a new man this year. That old self-confidence and bravado was ebbing away. And anyway, she wouldn’t know the way back home.

All the Swedish Christmas food was on display, just as you’d expect, but this year it wasn’t Lena who prepared it, but me and the children. Which is exactly as it should have been. After all, they were old enough now, and they needed to learn how to prepare the Julbord so they could pass on the tradition to our grandchildren, if we ever had any. And it was nice to see Lena joining in and helping, of course. 

Nobody said it, but we all knew that Lena couldn’t remember, or even follow a recipe any more.

Spending Christmas with the kids once again was beautiful. Even without Tomten, presents around the tree filled us with precious memories.

But it was the next day, Christmas Day, that stands out in my memory today. A day when dementia took another step forward into our lives and started to drive us apart.

We were together in the kitchen, Lena and I, and she wanted to help. So, I asked her to prepare the sprouts. Sprouts were never really a part of her Swedish cuisine.

— What do you want me to do with them?

— Well they’re large and a bit leafy. So let’s chop off the stem to take off the outer leaves …

— Like this?

— That’s it. And to get them tender and sweet, my mum used to cut a little cross in the stem. Like this.

I showed her. And off she went with her job. But when I checked a minute later, I saw that she was cutting the cross not in the stem, but in the leafy part. And cutting so deep that the whole sprout was falling apart.

— Whoah! Not like that. The cross goes at the other end.

— I’m doing it like you showed me.

— No. Like this. Look.

I showed her again. And watched. And once more she cut into the leafy part. No matter how many times I told or showed her, she got it wrong. Until I lost patience.

— Lena, I’m sorry, but you’re just not getting it. Maybe it’s better if I just do these sprouts myself. Why don’t you go and do something useful in the other room?

Without a word, she dropped the knife in the sink and left the kitchen.

When I’d finished everything, peeling the potatoes, carrots and parsnips too, I went back into the dining-room where I found Lena sitting at the table, head in hands. Her shoulders were trembling. I could see she was silently sobbing.

In all our years together, we’d never once had an argument, and I’d never made her cry.

And all because of my stupid insistence that a stupid cross should be cut in the stupid sprouts. As if it really mattered.

Ever since then when I’m preparing sprouts, I leave the crosses out.