In a hectic weekend reminiscnent of the social whirl of my halcyon youth I attended not one, but two parties. On Friday night it was our annual works 'do', which this year took the form of a piss-up in a room above a posh bar in Manchester's trendy Castlefield. Sunday was a more civilised experience altogether- the inaugural Levenshulme baby group Christmas party, held in the less palatial, but altogether more cosy surroundings of the local Catholic Club.
Charlotte had gone down early to help with preparations, but me and Frankie arrived a fashionable half-an-hour late to find the event already in full flow. Groups of mothers busied themselves around a table laden with home-made delicacies, while the menfolk- for whom the party was the first chance to get to know one another- huddled around the bar muttering conspirationally about at what point it would be acceptable to sneak into the snooker room next door and join the club regulars watching Arsenal against Chelsea on live Norwegian TV. Their offspring were nowhere to be seen, until I glanced downwards and found the floor literally crawling with infants. Narrowly avoiding committing the baby-party faux-pas of trampling a passing four-month old underfoot, I hastened to the bar, ordered the first of several pints of discounted, Social club-rate Guinness and prepared to enter the throng.
Within seconds we were surrounded by adoring females. They had no idea who I was, of course- but were well acquainted with little Frank, who gurgled happily at their greetings and smiled his trademark four-tooth smile for a couple of photographs. He kept smiling for about half-an-hour, at which point Santa Claus entered the room, and, for the second time in a week, sent him into uncontrollable tears. The poor sensitive fellow seems to find something frightening about the sight of a big fat person decked out in a garish red coat and an unconvincing white beard, marching around chortling manically and waving a big sack. I can't for the life of me imagine why, but I'm sure he'll get over it in time.
The rest of the party was spent dancing to Christmas carols with the babies and getting to know some of the grown-ups. I got talking to one of the dads, a Pakistani man who told me that he worked in a bank in Manchester, but that back home, he was a professional squash player. Squash is a very big deal indeed in Pakistan, so this is probably the equivalent of David Beckham leaving Real Madrid and going to work in a call centre in Karachi. On the other hand, of course, the bloke could just have been having me on. Either way, I will let him off as his wife brought to the party an excellent dish of chicken with fried rice, which I am prepared to bet was a great deal tastier than anything Posh Spice could manage.
In between listening to preposterous tales from Asian bank clerks, I discussed the travails of Manchester City with one of the mothers, a fervent Blue, and United's faltering season with one of the fellers, an equally avid Red. Before long I noticed he had gone missing, along with half the other dads. I looked in the snooker room and sure enough found them all huddled around the TV taking in Arsenal against Chelsea. It was half-time, and Pires was being interviewed, in French with Norwegian subtitles. The regulars looked on, nodding knowledgeably at intervals while sipping their Guinness. We are a cosmopolitan lot here in Levenshulme.
As the second half got underway at Highbury, the party was drawing to a close. I trundled Frankie under the train line and back home, where, knackered by his exertions on the dancefloor, he fell into a blissful sleep. Me and his mam watched a rubbish costume drama about the French Revolution on BBC2 (apparently it was all about a necklace, and not, as we have assumed all this time, about some cakes) while polishing off some pork pies liberated from the spread, along with the last of the chicken fried rice, which the Pakistani Posh Spice had kindly sent us home with. It was a restful end to a hectic, two-party weekend. If we can just keep that scary bloke with the red coat and the beard out of Frankie's way, it may be just the start of a joyful Christmas.
Ours don't like Father Christmas either, and I feel a bit guilty about encouraging them to like some weirdy beardy stranger.
Posted by: looby | December 16, 2004 at 10:08 PM
Well he is a pretty scary character altogether, isn't he? And I wouldn't want to meet one of those elves in a dark alley either.
A friend of mine's 5-year-old still believes in Santa, but on no account will he have him coming into his bedroom while he's asleep- 'Now he won't be coming in here, will he, mam?', he will say- and the stocking has to be left outside the door. This seems to me a nice balance between wide-eyed innocence and a commendable waryness of strange bearded men shooting down your chimney demanding to be plied with sherry.
Posted by: jonathan | December 17, 2004 at 09:20 AM