Angela Mollard: Embrace your imperfect, blended family circle this Christmas

As you prepare your traditional festive lunch, don’t forget to invite a few extras — and create a Christmas mash of family and guests in all its chaos and imperfection, writes Angela Mollard.

My Christmas is looking a lot like the royals’ shindig this year. Well, minus the palace and the free-range estate-reared turkey, the mortifying weigh-in – more of which later – and, ahem, Prince Andrew.

In all other respects, however, it is identical.

Like Charles and Camilla who will take over hosting duties from the Queen, I’ll be juggling a post-divorce blended family, absent loved ones, an extended family member at odds with me and a hotchpotch of guests troubled by work and health concerns.

Granted, I’m not dealing with claims that my family is racist but we’ll be braced for potential blunders over personal pronouns which I know my non-binary guest will handle with their usual grace.

But aren’t most families a little like this now? Our Prime Minister will doubtless be managing a new-look Christmas with his ex-wife, son and new partner.

Christmas will look a little different for the royal family, with both Queen Elizabeth and Prince Phillip now having passed.

Ben Affleck and his past and present Jennifers will be negotiating who has the kids and theKardashians will have to consider a carousel of current and ejected partners with the added bonus of TV cameras.

Even the Danish royals are disbanding with their usual pickled herring and schnapps with Princess Mary and her lot decamping down here while her brother-in-law and his family head to the US in the wake of a row over royal titles.

It’s easy when you’re in the midst of one of these misshapen families to feel sorry for yourself; to presume that the solid nuclear families are experiencing unalloyed joy as they don matching T-shirts and follow family traditions laid down half a century ago.

But in the eight years since I separated from my husband – who, incidentally, will be at our lunch on December 25 – I’ve come to prefer our self-styled Christmash to any formulaic Christmas.

Scrap the traditional Christmas feed- have a Christmash instead.

The benefit of a Christmash is that it embodies all the best of the human condition. Old hurts must be set aside, long-standing irritations tolerated, new people and customs embraced and, should that prove too much, a state of neutrality or grace adopted.

Instead of feeling shame or sadness at our awkward reconfigured celebrations, I’ve learned that they’re an opportunity totest the two qualities which are vital to an expansive rather than narrow life: curiosity and acceptance.

To that end our daughters continue to enjoy traditions created when our family was intact – notably the elaborate advent calendar they’ve had since they were babies, a tree laden with decorations made at kindy and a snuggle on the sofa with their Dad reading a cloth-bound copy of The Night Before Christmas. (Once when he was away with his partner he read it via Facetime).

But they’ve come to learn that this is also a time of year when we include others who might be on their own, friends whose family – like much of ours – live overseas and newcomers like my Japanese nephew who doesn’t typically celebrate Christmas but will do so with gusto this year.

Even the food is a collaboration, a spread of old favourites and new additions, renewed each year.

Christmas lunch gets a refresh this year which suits everyone.- Jenifer Jagielski

This Christmas we’re forgoing the prawns due to two guests with fish allergies and at least one dessert has to suit a coeliac.

Likewise, Karen Martini’s stupendous garlic bread recipe will include a gluten-free iteration.

Despite the obvious absence of the Sussexes, I hope Charles and Camilla can create their own Christmash combining the late Queen’s traditions with some more inclusive practices of their own. Previously, the Queen Consort’s son, Tom Parker Bowles, has spoken of how his mother would attend church and lunch at Sandringham with her husband before driving down to London inthe late afternoon to see him, his sister Laura Lopes and their children. Perhaps this year Camilla can have her children and grandchildren come to her.

Likewise, perhaps the Prince and Princess of Wales can spend Christmas with the Middletons. Following Harry and Meghan’s Netflix series and with Harry’s book, Spare, just days from publication, the couple and their children may value the chance to immerse themselves in another family far from the royal spotlight.

Harry and Meghan onscreen in their Netflix series. Picture: Netflix

In the past Kate bought her brother-in-law a “Grow Your Own Girlfriend” kit and William and Harry wearing Arsenal and AstonVilla strips respectively have led two teams of family and staff in a Christmas Eve fixture at Sandringham.

There will be sadness, obviously, at how their relationship has fragmented but with a proliferation of young children on both sides of the family there is still magic to embrace.

Indeed, the new King may take the opportunity to disband a long-standing tradition of weighing guests when they arrive and depart. The practice, which Princess Diana loathed, harks back to Edward VII who wanted to make sure his guests ate well.

The only thing we can rely on when it comes to families is that they will change. Some will be felled by illness or financial stress, others by relationship breakdown and, in the worst cases, by violence. Christmas with all its bauble brightness andforced jollity can illuminate what’s missing or been destroyed. But Christmash with all its chaos and imperfection is an invitation to be our better selves.

BARRY MANILOW AT THE TOP OF MY SPOTIFY WRAPPED

Do you have Spotify? Have you checked out your Spotify Wrapped, that fabulous little annual treat where the music streaming service crunches your listening habits and informs you which artists, songs and podcasts you listened to most?

I was away when it dropped but the second I returned home my daughters clamoured on to the couch so we could share our favourite tunes of the past year.

And here’s the thing – I knew this was going to be the year. The year when I was down with the kids. The year where I would “outcool” them and they would look on with surprise and pride because their mum was no longer listening to Gordon Lightfoot – lovely though he is – but bopping (do we still say bopping?) along to the likes of Glass Animals, Rufus Du Sol and The Weeknd.

Little did they know I had started the year with an intention to discover new music rather than playing old favourites (’90s Indie/Rolling Stones/the Nashville soundtrack) on constant rotation.

Barry Manilow found his way to the top of Angela Mollard’s Spotify Wrapped. Picture: Kevin Winter/Getty Images/AFP

To that end I started listening to Triple J, read the weekly music column in the UK’s Sunday Times and downloaded the soundtracks from interesting TV shows, notably Bridgerton, Sex Education, Everything I Know About Love and Breaking Bad.

My daughters’ generation could commandeer Kate Bush as if they, personally, had discovered her and endorse the Wiggles’ indie collabs with all their undergraduate enthusiasm but my choices would exhibit nuance, depth and an impressive contemporary repertoire layered with old-school gravitas.

Clicking into my “wrapped” looked promising. According to Spotify I had explored 47 different genres of music. As the platform told me: “Look at you, you little astronaut.”

I swelled with pride, even though I didn’t know whether this was a literal reference indicating I’m a natural explorer or a hip new label like, say, goblin mode (the Oxford Dictionary’s Word of 2022 which basically means slob).

It was all going so well. My genres were diverse. From “sunrise to sunset” I was “keeping it interesting” and my total listening time was 18,738 minutes which was more than 67 per cent of other listeners in Australia. (I’m sure the other 33 per cent are teens listening to Harry Styles in much the manner I wore out my record player at their age listening to Stevie Nicks and Don Henley singing Leather and Lace).

I couldn’t wait to find out my top song and top artist. Would it be Gretta Ray and her collab with Budjerah and Ngaiire, the perennially fabulous Kendrick Lamar, Brit duo Wet Leg or Maggie Rogers whose voice has so captivated me I did a deep dive to find out she was discovered by Pharrell Williams while still at college.

Spotify’s fluoro graphics suddenly gave way to a suspenseful message. I had listened to 1412 artists this year but one “rocked my world”. I could barely contain myself and then …

And then Barry Manilow’s nose filled the screen as the soaring chorus of Mandy burst from my phone.

My daughters fell off the couch laughing. “Barry Manilow! Your favourite artist is Barry Manilow?” yelped one. I doubt they have ever heard of Barry Manilow but his shiny polyester jacket, gelled hair and benevolent half smile told them all they needed to know.

Angela Mollard got a shock when her Spotify Wrapped was revealed. Picture: Tim Hunter.

Barry and I had apparently spent 1637 minutes together this year. And I was in the top 0.05 per cent of Barry Manilow listeners, according to Spotify. I can’t wait to meet our select little club, though TV host Amanda Keller has told me she’s a fan so there is that. As my daughters continued to laugh, Barry continued to sing … “and I need you today, oh Mandy”.

How could this be? No disrespect to Baz, but I couldn’t pick his songs from Neil Diamond or Cliff Richard. Even in my Leather and Lace days I never ventured into these big piano ballads.

The girls weren’t wearing my disbelief.

“No need to be embarrassed, Mum,” said the elder, while the youngest offered to show me her boyfriend’s mum’s Spotify Wrapped which, according to her, was really cool, interesting and diverse. The app rumbled on throwing up Barry’s hits before pronouncing me “a time traveller”. I was a “sonic historian” seeking out music “that’s new to you, regardless of whether it’s new to the rest of the world”.

How patronising. And I hadn’t even listened to Barry Bloody Manilow.

And then I remembered. Earlier in the year I’d been writing an article when, for some reason that eludes me, I needed to check the lyrics to Mandy. I do vaguely recall flicking to the “radio” option which gives you a playlist of similar artists because that’s been a vital tool in my year of discovery. I must have turned the sound down because I then went away for a few days and came home to find I’d failed to turn off my desktop computer and the playlist was still on a loop.

Unfortunately, no one is buying this explanation. So this one’s for you Baz; seems I can’t smile without you.

WHERE’S THE ROMANCE IN INSTA-STALKING YOUR PARTNER

My darling girls are both home so I take them out for Japanese. I love these moments, rarer now, when the three of us are together and it feels like we come together like the notes in a bottle of scent. There’s the old familiar blend of us but, increasingly, their singular characteristics shine through.

I love the way they think; the things that provoke their curiosity. And so it is that mid-Bento box, one wonders aloud how her Dad and I stalked each other when we first met back in 1997.

“How did you find out about his ex-girlfriends?” she inquires.

“I suppose I asked him,” I tell her, “though, to be honest, I wasn’t really that interested.”

They are startled by this, pointing out that it is now commonplace for their generation to undertake an ASIO-style investigation on any potential paramours.

One friend discovered that virtually every post her partner ‘liked’ was of a woman with barely any clothes on. She immediately broke things off. Picture: iStock

Apparently, you can find out a lot about a person by doing a deep dive into their social media and former partners can offer valuable intel.

“But isn’t it more fun, not to mention more respectful, to find out about them organically?” I venture, pointing out that you could discount some lovely people on the grounds that they’d had a slightly deranged looking ex or play E-grade badminton or appear to be unnaturally attached to their axolotls.

They look at me, the way they often do these days, as if I’m some analogue amusement. We discuss the pros and cons of doing due diligence on a love interest and they make it sound as alluring as doing a pest inspection on a toaster purchase.

I concede that online matchmaking as opposed to, say, meeting at work or through friends thwarts the ability to filter characteristics one might be particular about.

I mention that I couldn’t care less about wealth or height or hair loss but I’m turned off by certain voices and walks.

“What walks don’t you like?” the younger asks derisively, which is a bit rich coming from someone who went full bunny boiler, finding out as much as she could about her boyfriend when they first met. (I note to show her Fatal Attraction with Glenn Close).

Anyway, I ask a single mate in her late 40s whether she does this sort of surveillance on her Bumble dates.

“Absolutely,” she says. “By our age there’s all manner of acquired baggage. You need to sift the slightly distressed pre-loved from the toxically damaged.”

Another friend revealed that only the previous week she had jettisoned a good-on-screen romantic candidate after a trawl through his social media.

Having flirted online with Keith she cross-referenced his name, details he’d told her about his job and the area he lived to find his Instagram profile.

“For a 50-year-old man he followed a few age-inappropriate boobs and bums accounts but I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt,” she told me.

Further flirting revealed she’d stalked the wrong bloke. Relieved and with her interest now supercharged they continued messaging and she managed to extract sufficient intel to find the right Keith.

Encouraged by the surfing snaps and pics with his kids on his dating profile, my friend was full of expectation when she tapped into his Instagram. But delight soon turned to dismay.

Turns out 600 of the 625 accounts he followed were questionable.

“There were grandma MILFs, an account featuring a dildo photographed in locations around the world and hundreds of young hotties with virtually no clothes,” she reported. “I wanted to vomit.”

Just because he followed them, I ventured, didn’t mean he actually looked at them. Oh no, she countered, Keith was very active and while showing no interest in family pictures or anything wholesome, he vigorously “liked” any shot where the subject was virtually naked.

Although they had yet to meet she told me she wanted to punch him in the face, which I suppose is a natural reaction when the real Keith turned out to be worse than the wrong Keith. She messaged: “You don’t appear to follow anyone who wears clothes so I don’t think it’s going to work because I’m mostly clothed.”

While this level of screening makes for efficient pre-dating, I mourn the loss of those first heady days of romance and wonderment that come with a new partner’s slow reveal.

Will my kids’ generation ever enjoy that magic of discovering shared interests or funny coincidences if they’ve already conducted an online audit?

And how do filmmakers attempt thrillers like Sleeping With the Enemy or Single White Female if a quick Facebook stalk foreshadows that the love interest is a loon?

But my friend’s experience made me curious — I had never looked at who or what my partner follows on Instagram.

As I sat across from him, he didn’t look particularly nervous as I opened his account but I was. Gratifyingly there were no under-dressed young women.

Instead, there were all manner of fishing pics, the Inspired Unemployed and gruesome videos on a site called Nature Is Metal showing crocodiles attacking wildebeests.

Be careful what you search for.