The Twelve Days of Christmas

Trying to shake the sleep from my eyes this morning, I stood and looked out on the canal. There was something wrong with the picture. Still addled with the decay of half-life dreams, it took me a few moments to process what was different.

The canal was frozen.

Except for one small patch that stood up to the bullying of the -5°C temperature during the night, the water around my home was now supporting a thin crust of ice. Clearly baffled birds moved gingerly across the new environment. Hogging the one gash in the crystal skin were three swans, new visitors to my stretch of the Regent. While I and everything else shivered, they were the epitome of effortless elegance.

When I ventured outside, the cold air stripped away the last trace of sleep, but the surprises kept coming. At the point where the Westway traffic rumbles oblivious over the canal, more than 100 geese were gaggling. A honking chorus sounded as I pushed through them. Beaks were snapped open and shut like teen hoods trying to intimidate by playing with knives. Thankfully my ankles and knees escaped unpecked.

With the swans, geese, the partridge I ate at the Army and Navy Club and number of Lords I met last week, I feel as if every day at the moment is trying to offer up a gift category from The Twelve Days of Christmas. There have been no gold rings, maids or calling birds yet. However, given that Christmastide does not actually start to the 25th, there is plenty of time for the universe to deliver.