Jackie McGregor: Could it be magic? No, it was something much more powerful

I’ve bought new decorations over the years, but the ones that belonged to my parents are my favourites.

They had been touched by my late parents’ hands and had hung on the tree in my childhood home, as witnesses to my family’s festive celebrations, sadly, a family that has now disappeared into the ether, like all those Christmases past.

One tatty decoration I uncovered seemed to open a little doorway in time, and I found myself travelling back to my six-year-old self as I sat mesmerised, watching my mother’s hands sculpt a piece of tinfoil in Blue Peter fashion, into a reindeer.

She tied a piece of wool around his neck and hung him from the tree.

The way his legs were shaped he looked like he was flying. I thought my mother had magic hands!

Back then, 1970s trouble-torn Belfast was a bleak place, so going downtown with my mother to see the Christmas window displays of Robinson & Cleaver and Anderson & McAuley department stores, was beyond exciting.

Even more thrilling, was visiting the big Co-op to see Santa.

This had a tunnel with mechanical snowmen and penguins, kids now with all their tech wizardry would think this lame, but to me it was a wonderland.

As I continued to recall those times, I could picture my mother decorating the house with holly and mistletoe, the tree was a magnificent affair, after dad had waged battle with the lights.

Our home always felt cozy and safe, but Christmastime seemed to fill it with an air of magic.

Christmas Days were fabulous, with thoughtful gifts, and intoxicating cooking smells accumulating in a delicious feast served to a large, happy family, all to be repeated on Boxing Day.

Those memories are precious to recall.

Now that I’m a parent I have endeavoured to recreate magical Christmases for my son, like the ones my parents created for me.

I want him to carry them in his heart and recount them to his own children, like I’ve done with him.

He never met my mother and has only vague memories of my father.

When you lose a parent life splits into two – the ‘with’ and ‘without’ eras.

And as I sat in my ‘without’ era, dilapidated reindeer in hand, my heart smiled in remembrance.

Mum could never have known the comfort that tinfoil reindeer would bring me some fifty years after its creation.

It was like holding her hand through time.

No doubt people will be unpacking precious memories this season, as they bring out their decorations, and uncover ghosts of Christmas past amongst the baubles and homemade treasures.

It’s not Christmas gifts that children remember, it’s the traditions and loving gestures that stay with us always.

Mum’s reindeer took me back to intensely happy times, and briefly, I longed to be back there, in that magical ‘with’ era.

During those Christmases I was convinced that magic filled the air in our house, I realise now it wasn’t magic, it was love!