“Season of damp grey mistiness
Close bosom friend of the hidden sun. 
Conspiring with him how not to bless, 
the miserable people who round the pavements run.
Desperate for warmth and blue sky…”

I may not be Keats, but if he’d written about January instead of Autumn, it might have gone like that… a bit!

January has to be one of the most depressing months of the year. Christmas is over and I haven’t even seen a snowdrop yet. However, I am one of the chosen few to have a birthday this month. It’s not the best time of year to celebrate, but as this was a significant round number I decided to give it a try, with a lot of help from family and friends.

Ever since the first lockdown I have been spoiling for a party. As the youngest of five, I evolved into a bit of a rule-breaker. It’s just a modus operandi which I slip into as soon as someone lays down a rule. It must have started young, because I remember being told not to climb the high brick wall around our garden and walk along it. But there it was, a rule to be broken, and the result was a nasty fall into the bushes with scrapes that wound right round my torso. My mother said, “I told you not to climb on the wall!” It’s hard to explain why that sounded like an invitation to the seven-year-old me.

It was even worse at secondary school where there were dress codes laid down rigorously about not rolling up shirt sleeves and doing up your top shirt button under the tie. But if you were wearing a tie, who would know if the top button was undone? The headteacher apparently, who had eagle eyes and caught me offending on all counts, repeatedly. Somehow, I managed to escape expulsion – just!

So fast forward a few years and Covid strikes with its rules and lockdowns. I have honestly done my best to keep the rules, mostly. I understand why they are there and have attempted to comply with the important stuff. But the lack of freedom, isolation and list of what wasn’t allowed over the past two years has made me crave company and fun and yes, a party.

So, when my family asked what I wanted for my birthday, I said, “A party!”

The planning began and invitations were sent – the future was looking bright – not orange. Then Omicron landed and I felt that cold trickle of disappointment slide down my back again – yet another fun event cancelled. Covid strikes again!

But there is a God. He made January after all and gave us the resources to develop vaccines and so after a few wobbly weeks, the party was back on.

There was shopping to be done, table plans to be drawn up, cake makers to be chivvied. We hit a few speed bumps along the way. There was one memorable moment in a supermarket, when the card machines had gone loopy, just as we were trying to pay for two huge trollies piled with food and drink. One of them had to be wheeled into the cooler, while I trekked to a cashpoint, meanwhile the car had run over time in the carpark. “You couldn’t make it up,” said a voice beside me.

But it wasn’t all problems. The venue was pretty perfect. All the family remembered shoes – even if some were the wrong colour. Guest arrived on time from almost every corner of the UK, including Ireland and Wales. We didn’t need to call on Jesus to turn the water into wine because there was loads and we even toasted Her Majesty with glasses of port.

At the end of the evening, I felt like my party shaped vacuum had been well and truly filled to the brim. I had hugged (because we’d all done lateral flow tests!) laughed, listened, gossiped, giggled, and sometimes just watched my nearest and dearest in animated conversations or tirelessly moving between kitchen and table with delicious food and drink to keep the party going.

So misty, miserable January has turned out OK this year. The party actually felt a bit like the end of a long diet, having been starved of all the things I love, I have finally been able to sit down to a truly delicious meal of friendship, family and just being alongside people without masks. I am really hoping this is the beginning of the end of covid rules and lockdowns for the foreseeable future. Whatever happens next it has been a good way to begin 2022.