How are you getting on there? I’ll go first.
I’m at that point where the names of the days lose all relevance. All I have to anchor myself in the month are the days before; Boxing Day was three sleeps ago, which means today must be the 29th. Is it Saturday or Sunday? A Sunday, according to my phone screen, in a week of seemingly Sundays, where lethargy and indulgence are the order of every day.
My mind is surprisingly active. Despite the lowered expectations of what anyone is meant to achieve this week, I feel a restless energy bubbling beneath the surface. And yet, I cancelled my morning yoga class, drawn instead to sleep — two extra hours that I didn’t strictly need but desperately wanted at the time.
At the dinner table late on Christmas Day, when the cold meats, cheeses, and chutneys made their appearance, someone remarked, “That’s when you know you’ve made it: when you can eat without being hungry.” This simple philosophy, pronounced over a picky tea, captures the essence of this season. Wants and needs are indistinguishable. (Have they ever truly been distinct?)
My brain clings to numbers, finding order in the numerical over the nominal. I know I had a friend’s birthday dinner on the 27th, providing some sort of reference point on a Friday that could have been a Monday judging by the emptiness of Shoreditch. As for the rest, I’m adrift in these in-between days, wandering toward the peak of the 31st, before everything resets back to 1/1.
Once you have perspective, you can decide which way to go. Though sometimes you have to move in order to know where you are. And sometimes when you move, it will seem that the landscape is moving too.
– Joanna Walsh
Betwixtmas, they call it — a stretch of days so detached from our usual grind of productivity. I can’t quite pinpoint when this period became so cemented in our cultural psyche that it warranted its own title. We’re good at naming things, aren’t we? It’s our way of pinning meaning onto the seemingly meaningless. A fox in the garden is just a pest until you name it, and suddenly it’s a familiar guest. Similarly, drunken alter egos are embarrassing until they’re christened.
We label this week to make sense of days that might otherwise dissolve into nothingness. And god forbid we should do nothing. For some, it's the pinnacle of the season — the freedom of days unfettered by the tyranny of the clock. For others, it’s a sanctuary: a time for impromptu plans, guilt-free hibernation, or grazing on leftovers while rewatching old shows on TV.
For those of us already in a state of between-ness, everyone else is just catching up.
Names are one way of anchoring ourselves. My one-year-old nephew is learning names. He calls me “Moh-Moh.” Not quite “Mol” — he hasn’t yet mastered rounding off his L’s, so every name comes out with an adorable twang. Mickey Mouse becomes “Mick-Mick,” and Father Christmas — my favourite — is just “Chris.”
Each time he names me, I’m almost brought to tears. Stripped to a two-syllable call, it hardly matters; it’s enough that it’s coming from him. I’m not just a generic pair of arms eager to scoop him up. I have become a specific person who meets a specific need for him, even if it’s just to turn on his electric train set. “Moh-Moh do.”
The relationship we share is unique, existing solely between him and me. Yet, the role of being an auntie adds another dimension to who I am. I absorb that identity, allowing it to mutate and grow in step with him.
As our relationships shift, so does our sense of self. It’s hard not to feel untethered when the people we orbit — family, friends, partners — change course or drift away. Such shifts throw everything off balance, and this has been a year of landslides. Add Moh-Moh. Subtract girlfriend. Divide daughter.
When the axis around which you define yourself shifts, you reach for a new centre of gravity. And if that centre, for now, is a two-syllable half-pronunciation of my name, I’ll take it. It’s a steady marker to rebuild from, no matter how small or provisional.
What matters resides in relationships rather than things – between us, rather than within us.
– James Bridle
The thing about Sundays is that they’re revered because of contrast — what comes before and what follows. They’re haloed by the busy energy of Saturday and the looming grind of Monday.
In the same way, this strange, free-floating week punctuates a year in which we rarely get space for indulging, dreaming, snoozing, wallowing, or escaping. January is to Betwixtmas what Monday is to Sunday — it’s the hard edge, the contrast, that gives this time its significance.
Controversial as it may be, I’m ready for Monday to arrive. Ready for routines to resume, for the world to recalibrate, for the days to have names that mean something again.
We often get caught in the illusion that arriving at a predetermined destination will end the mental agitation of feeling in-between.
– Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche
That may be, but I’m under no such illusions. I may not expect massive changes when the clock strikes midnight, but I’ll welcome the return of imposed structure with open arms, ready to embrace a fresh start laced with the lessons brought forth from the chaos of 2024 (I’ll save those for a future post, maybe) — and some new names to add to my roster.
what’s simmering
Days since last bolognese: 5 (a Christmas Eve miracle!)
Fun fact & shout out to #topbabe
who (1) read a draft of this post and (2) heard someone refer to this week as Crimbo Limbo, which is far more fun.My quick-fire Rose, Bud, Thorn of 2024:
🌹 Female friendships. They’ve been my anchor in a year of tectonic shifts.
🌱 This newsletter. The tiny seedling of something I’m excited to grow, with you.
🌵 Two syllables: Break-ups.Now, your turn: What are you between?
"As our relationships shift, so does our sense of self. It’s hard not to feel untethered when the people we orbit — family, friends, partners — change course or drift away." Yes! Your words brought me back to the joy of being an aunt before I had kids of my own (and before my nieces grew away from the games we had together). It's such a fascinating dynamic, the shifting self when who we are to someone else shifts. It's so poignant with children, as they grow. What a lovely post. Tried so hard to get a post out during the in-between, but only managed after. Something about that time I wanted to capture - you've done a swell job of it.
Love as always, particularly the sprinkling in of rose bud and thorn exercise. I really hate the crimbo limbo, to me it feels stagnant, bloated, unproductive (😬 hustle hustle). Bring on 2025 sister!