25GoC: C.K. Kelly Martin + contest

Christmas 1993: Faraway & So Close
By: C.K. Kelly Martin

I’ve been thinking about this Christmas post for awhile – about what I want to say about the holiday. Mostly I spend Christmas in Canada with family – exchanging cards and gifts, eating turkey and all the things that go along with it, watching classic (and not so classic) Christmas movies, and generally taking it easy. But recently I started thinking about a Christmas I spent in Dublin, far from family, way back in 1993.

I’d been living in Ireland on and off since graduating from university in1992 but 1993 was going to be my first Christmas away from home. I was working in a video store (a job that paid peanuts but which I loved) called Xtra-Vision, in a part of Dublin named Ranelagh, at the time. Our branch was going to be closed on Christmas Day but the Rathmines branch (only about a twenty minute walk away) would be open and they were looking for people from other branches to come in and help man the store for the day – double time pay.  

I didn’t think I wanted to work Christmas Day, regardless of the fact that my roommate and best friend was going to be out of town and that I had no real clue how else I’d spent my day. And then a friend who was part of the Dublin comedy circuit very thoughtfully asked if I wanted to spend Christmas with him and his family. Yes, I did, thanks very much!

In Ireland they have a name for people from other places who are living in the Emerald Isle, they call them blow-ins. Most of my close friends at the time happened to be other blow-ins. One was from Australia and had an amazing singing voice; another was a Kiwi and gave some of the best advice I’ve ever received. The three of us arranged to spend Christmas Eve hanging out at my flat. My friends stayed until about four in the morning and I can’t remember what we ate or what we talked about but I do remember thinking that hanging out with Louise and Michele was the absolute best was to spend Christmas Eve in Dublin. I didn’t feel far from home. I didn’t feel lonely. I felt like I was in the right place at the right time with the right people. 

The next day, Christmas itself, I spent with my comedy friend and his parents and siblings (who I’d never met before but quickly found to be lovely, generous people) eating turkey and handfuls of Cadbury Roses chocolate and playing Trivial Pursuit. And all of that was completely perfect too – a true Irish family Christmas. I slept over at his sister and her husband’s house that night and the next day (Stephen’s Day in Ireland and what we call Boxing Day in Canada) I went back to my job at Xtra-Vision, grateful that I’d had a family to spend Christmas with rather than earning double-time doling out videos at the Xtra-Vision in Rathmines.

I hope I thanked Ian, Michele and Louise at the time but guys, I still remember and I’m going to send you a link to this. Thank you for making my Christmas back in 1993!

To end this off and complete the flashback, I want to include a U2 song that was top of the charts in Ireland for most of December 1993 - Stay (Faraway & So Close):

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Ms. Martin has so graciously donated a prize pack for one lucky winner. The
giveaway will be for a signed paperback of I Know It's Over, a signed hardcover of One Lonely Degree and a Lighter Side of Life and Death journal (picture to the right)

Open to U.S. and Canada only

Closes Dec.25^th

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Thanks so much

Jill