I tried to write a festive column. It sucked the fat man's balls (and I don't mean Santa Claus). It was just too depressing to think back. It's not the bad Christmases which depress me, it's the happy ones. If that doesn't make sense to you then thank your lucky pants.

So I was at a loss and wasn't going to write anything. Then I read Bus's latest column and it reminded me that some years ago I penned a festive short story and put it in my work mates cards. I took it out again before handing them around though. So, for the first time ever, I give you...

A Very Gerald Christmas

EDITOR’S NOTE – This article first appeared in ‘Chap Magazine’ as part of their series of Celebrity Christmas Reports. It was written by Sir Gerald Benson – Cabinet Secretary and Head of the Civil Service. Sir Gerald was chosen for a number of reasons but no one will admit to knowing any of them.

Christmas in the Benson household rarely contains surprises. There is Mrs Benson’s enormous intake of food and alcohol, the hours I spend wrapping whatever improbable items I purchased for my darling wife and the fact that we always seem to invite Mrs Benson’s brother. As the clock chimes to signify the handover from Eve to Day, Chez Benson holds the following dramatis personae. Me (Sir Gerald Horatio Benson), Mrs Benson (my wife), Mrs Benson’s brother Beverly and my older brother Caecillious’ second ex-wife Virginia. The four bedrooms of Benson Towers ring to the sounds of snoring. Only Mrs Benson actually snores but hers have the power to rattle all the fixtures and fittings of the homestead. Imagine the sound of a volcanic eruption played at the wrong speed, to the accompaniment of a dozen adenoidal dinosaurs. Also played at the wrong speed. Or something like that.

Five o’clock and Mrs Benson rises. It is the one morning of the year that she surfaces from her slumbers before I. There is a childlike enthusiasm for gifts about Mrs Benson. Normally she only becomes excited by a game of Rugger or seeing Unbelievable Adrian battle Enormous Eddie Huge on World of Wrestling (cable television has a lot to answer for). I once made the mistake of speculating that as an athletic contest, it may lack verisimilitude with regard to the precise correlation between the stated desire to inflict corporeal contusions upon the second party and the actual nature of the incidents performed, perhaps even involving a degree of predetermination as to the likely concatenation of circumstances leading to the conclusion of the alleged contest. She poured a plate of toad in the hole over my head and said I should speak English. And yes, Mrs Benson’s toad in the hole can literally be poured.

The Christmas Tree stands resplendent, covered in more colourful accessories than a drag artist and containing more lights than a concussed man’s field of vision. It also houses (in the sense of being on top of) gifts. Gratuities. Tokens of affection between man, wife and close friends. Take last year for example. I bought Mrs Benson a gold necklace (with the almost correct inscription “I live you Mrs Benton”), a pile of blank video cassettes which could all but be seen from Space, a signed photograph of Unbelievable Adrian (she would never know who really signed it), a new set of studs for her rugby boots, a balloon flight, a weekend in Paris (she ended up missing my point and took Mrs Benderghast – second fifteen fly half) and the biggest box of chocolates I had ever seen. It was colossal – it must have been a quarter of an acre at least. You may think you have seen big boxes of confectionary before but trust me – you haven’t. So it was a bugger to wrap as you can imagine. In return she gave me a pen. Rather sweetly, she had it inscribed with the name of my bank. She knows how important my finances are to me. One year I recall she gave me two suits of the finest quality, five beautiful silk ties and a blazer which took the breath away. Unfortunately, she had simply picked up my dry cleaning and stuck a bow on it. But it was the thought that counted. And her thought was how to avoid spending any money on me.

Every year I am forced to buy something for Beverley and last year chose a “Go Away And Leave Me Alone” mug. He assumed it was a joke and laughed heartily. That was also the Christmas where he helped himself to a whole box of nuts, all the left over turkey, the radiator from the back bedroom and nine of my best shoes. If you ever have the misfortune to encounter Mrs Benson’s brother Beverly, keep a hand on your wallet and change the subject immediately if he uses the word “borrow”. Beverly was also bearing gifts – Mrs Benson had her alarm clock returned (only missing one spring) and I was reunited with my slippers. Well, slipper but it was still better than the year he gave me a newt. Virginia always gets handkerchiefs. This is because she appears to do an awful lot of crying. She says it is an allergy to something (knowing the way Life works, it is probably an allergy to handkerchiefs) but I suspect she has never quite recovered from Caecillious running off with Lady Scunthorpe. No sooner had he explained how her husband had been murdered (Caecillious is a private detective in case there is anyone who doesn’t know that) while alone in his bath, than Cae was sending us postcards from Belgium and saying he had finally found his soul mate. Cae may have the finest brain in all of recorded history but his heart is a little more human.

So picture the scene – Mrs Benson surrounded by gifts, hyperactive from massive chocolate consumption and determined to drink her own bodyweight. Which is quite a feat when one has met Mrs Benson. She is, how can I put this ? Huge. Massive. She sees door frames as a challenge, she hasn’t seen her feet since last they sported clogs and whenever she wears a floral print dress, she is mistaken for a sofa. Beverly is going through people’s jacket pockets and I am reading whatever improving book I bought myself. I hit upon an ingenious scheme some years before. I invented an aging uncle. He is blessed with the gift to buy me exactly what I want for Christmas. Whenever Mrs Benson expresses a desire to meet Uncle Edmund, I simply tell her he is in Scotland and this puts her off. Mrs Benson was once involved in an ugly incident at Loch Ness (the details of which I fear you can guess) and vowed never to set foot in the “barbaric North” ever again. Rugby tours excepted of course.

It falls to me to cook Christmas dinner and it is an opportunity I relish. I lose myself in a world of cutting, slicing, dicing, mixing, stuffing, pans, dishes, ovens, vegetables and Delia Smith. I don’t know if you are familiar with Ms Smith’s work but she is a miracle worker. Which, I think you will agree, is rather appropriate for the time of year. Lunch is served promptly, some time after midday. Firstly, we have to strip search Beverly to scrape together enough cutlery to eat with. Then we pull the crackers. Many is the year that my dinner has been immeasurably improved by winning a small piece of plastic. One year, I swear, I will work out what the heck it is meant to be. Seeing Mrs Benson eat is reminiscent of a David Attenborough documentary. I shall say no more. Beverly, forced by a compulsion buried deeper in his psyche than any one cares to delve, steals little bits of dinner and hides them in his underwear. I don’t know why he bothers – there is always plenty to go round, even with Mrs Benson in attendance. Virginia picks at her food as though she were a surgeon and had never once laughed at a cracker joke. My personal favourite is “What is brown and sticky ?” but I regret I can't remember the punch line right now. Something not as rude as it sounds – that much I am sure of. I dislike innuendos and resent having them shoved down my throat.

At three o’clock everything stops. For the one time in the entire year, I put my foot so firmly down that people actually ask if I have hurt myself. Her Majesty is addressing her people. I am an unashamed fan of Her Majesty and hang on her every well chosen word. Mrs Benson may be snoring her bulbous head off, Beverly may be wining about putting the Cartoon Channel on and Virginia may be sobbing, snuffling and blowing. But I am rooted to the spot, proudly erect, listening to the finest woman in the Empire as She inspires us all. Once she has finished (too soon in my opinion), it is back to normal. I clear away the mass of pots and pans, tell Beverly that he may not borrow the fridge for reasons he is reluctant to disgorge and let Virginia know that nuts will soon be served. For reasons unexplained, nuts are the only thing that Virginia would stop blubbing long enough to enjoy. Maybe if Caecillious had been a little more forthcoming with his nuts, their messy divorce may not have happened.

In the evening, we receive guests into the Benson household. These generally consist of my younger brother David and whatever girl he drapes from his arm, Christopher and Petunia Dad-Collandar and the Bentworthys – the unmarried brother and sister combo of Crispin and Alyson. I once had a little thing for Alyson (see my third volume of memoirs for the full story). We play party games, tell each other the story of the past year and generally have a good time. Virginia is, by this stage, in her bedroom cutting up whatever photographs she has unearthed of Caecillious. Mrs Benson is sleeping ferociously and Beverly has been caught red handed and locked in the broom cupboard until he has learned his lesson.

And so the Benson Christmas has a sort of symmetry to it – it begins with the joy of presents and ends with the friends I still have from my past. It is just the bit in between which grates like a cheese convention. Her Majesty providing the only glimmer of pleasure. I did suggest that Christopher and Petunia, David and Girl and Alyson and Crispin Bentworthy be invited for the whole day but Mrs Benson objected. I think this stems from her not actually knowing that they come round at all – after all, she rarely does. I suppose what I am saying is that at this time of year, My Readers, you should tolerate your family and enjoy your friends. Eat, drink, be merry and lock up any thieving wretches you uncover. And a small sedative placed in you wife’s mulled wine never goes amiss.

24th December 2003