A few years ago I had 3 grandparents still alive. Not my fave grandad sadly, who passed away a long time ago, who name I can’t even type decades later without welling up. But 3 grandparents. Alive and well. My mum and dad were still together, and I’d just met my wife, and there were there several consecutive years where we’d hit the pub on Christmas Day, the hours from Midday to Two that if you’re English well if you know you just you know how amazing that time can be when the entire neighbourhood gathers in the bar to celebrate. And those hours were electric. I’d have friends pop in to see us and just witness this entire glorious beautiful family in all its variegated haphazard glory ripping up this idyllic country pub with endless jokes and perennial banter and good cheer and tell me how lucky I was. And deep down I knew it was fleeting and I knew it couldn’t last forever but I was wrapped up in each frame cherishing these utterly gorgeous moments. Those few snatched hours on those few snatched Christmas days were in some way probably the most beautiful of my life. Then my grandparents died in succession. My parents spilt up. The country pub closed down. My best friend and I stopped speaking. My sister got ill. My dad and his brother fell out . All part of life’s rich tapestry and my life is still amazing and it’s all just a slice of life’s collective myriad miniature ocean of events. But often I think back to those Christmases and know that for a few small hours on those few small days we really had it all, I had the entire nexus of the world in the palm of my hand. Treasure every moment folks with the older generation of your family because life comes at you fast.