Each year, the post office printed a leaflet that gave you the last dates for sending Christmas parcels overseas. You could find the same information on the internet, and that was far more convenient, but Pat Fitz liked having the leaflets as well. They were part of a thrilling countdown that she looked forward to every year.
You’d get the first real nip in the air around the end of October or the beginning of November. There’d be a tang of wood smoke curling from garden bonfires, and sea salt blown by Atlantic winds. As the bracken and wildflowers died back on the mountains, the grey shapes of the stone walls would stand out between the fields. In the town, the lights would glow in the shops as the evenings began to get foggy. And if you went for a walk on the beach you’d need a scarf.
Then, as November went on, you’d start to get in the fruits and spices to make the cake and the pudding. And the deli down the way from the butcher’s would start selling Christmas treats. There’d be long boxes of sticky black dates preserved in honey, and old-fashioned sweets that Pat’s husband ate, like Hadji Bey’s Turkish Delight, and things she liked herself, like Amaretti. And chocolate Bath Oliver biscuits in tall tins.
Then, come December, you’d be looking for lifts into Carrick, to start choosing presents to send to the grandkids. And you’d drop round the corner to Lissbeg post office to get your stamps and your airmail stickers, and see if the leaflets were out. Pat always tucked hers up on the mantelpiece over the range. The truth was that she knew well what the postal dates were for Canada. They hardly changed at all from year to year. But the sight of the leaflet lifted her heart – and, anyway, there were different dates for posting cards and parcels. She always sent hers early, but you’d want to be sure all the same.
One year, at a Christmas fête, she’d found cards that were photographs of Broad Street. You could see the shops on one side, and the old convent on the other, and the horse trough in the centre covered in snow, like sugar icing, and bright stars above in the night sky. And there was a glittery bunch of mistletoe in the top right-hand corner, with glittery writing underneath that said ‘Across the Miles . . .’.
Her kitchen was on the first floor, at the front of the house, above the butcher’s shop. It was a fierce busy time of year and a great season for business. Ger would be below at the counter, trussing up Christmas turkeys. And Pat would be above in the firelight, with the kettle singing on the range and the tea made.
And each year, as the excitement built, the coloured lights strung out across Broad Street would shine onto the table where she’d sit writing her cards.