Christmas Countdown Calendar Day 15

Theme: Making Friends and Maintaining Friendships

December 15, 2025 – 10 days to Christmas

Today’s Story: The Hailhe de Nadau

Julien sat at his kitchen table, staring at his Hailhe de Nadau list, while his father shouted at the television in the next room about a football referee who’d apparently committed crimes against humanity and should be tried at The Hague.

On the list: getting hold of the wood needed (12 cubic meters, source TBD, possibly prayer), fire safety coordination (volunteer brigade, insurance forms, liability waivers that made it sound like they were launching rockets instead of lighting a bonfire), community outreach (flyers, announcements, someone’s nephew who could allegedly “do social media”), food preparation (soup, wine, chestnuts), and approximately forty-seven other tasks that Julien had inherited because his name had been drawn from a hat at the village meeting and everyone else had suddenly remembered urgent appointments in other departments.

His phone buzzed. His daughter Sophie, calling from Bordeaux. He could hear anxiety in the ringtone. “Dad, my landlord is raising rent again. I know you said you couldn’t help but—”

In the living room, his father bellowed: “JULIEN! The remote isn’t working! I’m hungry! And that referee should be in PRISON! Are you LISTENING?”

Julien closed his eyes. Breathed in through his nose, and entertained—briefly but sincerely—the idea of walking into the Landes forest and never coming out again.

His phone buzzed again. Text this time. Marie, his childhood friend: I can see your kitchen light is still on. I’m coming over with a bottle of Tursan.

Headlights swept across the yard a moment later.

Marie came in without knocking, shook the cold from her coat, took one look at Julien’s face and said, “Mon vieux, you look like something the cat dragged in, dragged back out, and then refused responsibility for.”

“Good evening to you, too.”

She sat at the kitchen table, in “her” chair, hers since she was six, found two mismatched glasses—one wedding gift, one from a service station—and poured the dark Tursan wine. She took a long sip. “Where’s the list?”

“Marie, really, I can manage—”

“You’ve been trying to organise the Hailhe all on your own for the last two weeks, and I’ve watched you age approximately ten years. You’re going to give yourself an ulcer.”

She fixed him with the look that made her sheep line up without being asked. “You’re caring for your father, who has dementia and the personality of an angry badger. You’re supporting a daughter who can’t afford Bordeaux rent on a teacher’s salary—nobody can afford Bordeaux rent on a teacher’s salary. And you have to organise a pagan fire festival that requires coordinating thirty people, several tons of wood, and the cooperation of the volunteer fire brigade who, let’s be honest, think this whole thing is a lawsuit waiting to happen. You cannot handle it on your own. Stop pretending you’re Superman.”

From the living room: “JULIEN! Is someone here? Are we being robbed? Should I call the police? WHERE’S MY PHONE?”

“IT’S MARIE, PAPA!” Julien shouted back. “YOU KNOW MARIE! SHE’S BEEN HERE A THOUSAND TIMES!”

Silence. Then: “WHO’S MARIE?”

Julien dropped his head into his hands. “He doesn’t know who I am. Keeps calling me by my uncle’s name. Yesterday, he introduced me to the postman as ‘that man who keeps breaking into my house.'”

Marie squeezed his hand. “My mother had Alzheimer’s, remember? I know. It’s exhausting and frustrating, and you feel guilty for becoming frustrated, which makes you more exhausted, which makes you feel guiltier.”

“How did you—” Julien’s voice cracked. “How did you cope?”

“I asked for help. ”

She pulled his list towards her.

‘You need wood?”

“Twelve cubic meters of good burning wood, properly seasoned—”

“My neighbour Bernard has it. He owes me for helping with his ewes during lambing season—complicated birth, very dramatic, I saved his prize ewe’s life, and he cried. I’ll arrange delivery. Fire safety coordination?”

“I need to coordinate with the volunteer brigade, file insurance forms, get them to sign off—”

“My son Lucas is in the brigade. Sixteen years old, thinks he’s a hero, will do anything if I promise to stop telling his girlfriend about the time he cried watching Ratatouille. I’ll handle it. Food preparation?”

“I was going to make soup, organise wine, chestnuts—”

“Delegate it. Ask Claudine—she’s been wandering around the village like a ghost since her husband died, desperate to find something useful to do. She’ll make enough soup to feed the entire fire département, and she’ll love you forever for asking.”

Julien stared at the list—at Marie systematically dismantling his anxiety with six phone calls and the particular rural French superpower of knowing everybody’s business, and who owed what to whom.

“Why are you doing this?” he asked quietly.

“Because we’re friends. Because you stood by me when Guillaume died, and my teenagers went off the rails. Because sandwich generation stress is a special kind of hell—caring for parents, supporting children, getting crushed in the middle—and nobody should have to do it alone.”

On Christmas Eve, la Veille de Noël, the Hailhe de Nadau bonfire was ready on a hill overlooking Saint-Sever—twelve cubic meters of wood (delivered by Bernard’s tractor, stacked perfectly, seasoned to perfection) arranged in a traditional pyre. Around it, the village had gathered: maybe eighty people, bundled in coats and scarves and wool hats with pompoms, holding cups of Claudine’s soup (chestnut, bacon, cream, so absurdly good that people were already asking for the recipe), waiting for sunset.

A tradition older than anyone could remember: on Christmas Eve, bonfires are lit across the Landes from hill to hill, an unbroken chain of light stretching back to pagan winter solstice celebrations that predated civilisation itself. Once the first fire was lit, the next village would see it and light theirs, fire calling to fire across the darkness, a tradition that had been honoured for hundreds of years.

Hailhe—the old Gascon word for firewood, for the bundle of wood, for the fire itself. Nadau—Christmas. The fire of Christmas. The light in the longest dark.

Julien stood near the pyre with the ceremonial torch. His father was somewhere in the crowd, being supervised by Sophie, who’d come home for Christmas after Julien had quietly sent her three months’ rent he didn’t have and would be paying off until Easter.

Marie appeared beside him, “Ready?”

“I don’t know why we still do this,” Julien said. “Light fires on hills, pretend it means something—”

Marie didn’t answer right away. She watched the villagers shifting their weight, the way people do when they’re cold but unwilling to leave, cups of soup steaming in their hands, children tugging at their sleeves, the old ones standing maybe a little closer to the fire than necessary.

“It’s about memories,” she said at last. “Not the kind that lives neatly in your head and answers when you call it, but the kind that survives for centuries. Because eighty people showed up on Christmas Eve to watch wood burn because their grandparents did, and their great-grandparents before them, and even when names go missing, and faces blur, and stories fall apart mid-sentence, the body remembers what to look for in the dark. Because somewhere back in the mists of time, some freezing genius said ‘let’s light a fire so big we can see it from the next village’ and everyone said ‘yes, excellent idea, very sensible.’ Now light the thing before everyone freezes their but off.”

Julien touched the torch to the base of the pyre. As the first spark caught, a murmur ran through the group—not surprise, not excitement exactly, but recognition. Heads turned toward the next hill, eyes searching, waiting. Flames were soon devouring the wood hungrily, orange and gold and red against the darkening sky, crackling and snapping, sending sparks out in all directions.

People cheered. Someone started singing—”Nadau, Nadau, Nadau”—in Gascon, the old language few of them still spoke, though everyone knew the words, the way you know prayers or nursery rhymes or the lyrics to lullabies your grandmother sang.

The fire burned higher, visible for kilometres, a beacon, a signal, a call.

“Regardez!” Marie shouted, pointing across the valley. “Hagetmau has lit theirs!”

Across the valley, another fire blazed to life. Then another—Grenade-sur-l’Adour, then Aire-sur-l’Adour, then Tartas. Chain of light across the Landes, fire answering fire, exactly as it had for centuries. You could see them all from here, little points of light scattered across the dark landscape like stars fallen to earth.

“Dad.” Sophie appeared suddenly, voice tight with panic, eyes wide. “Papie’s wandered off. I turned around for two minutes to take a photo, and he was gone—”

Julien’s stomach dropped into his boots. His father! Darkness. Fire. The woods. Oh no oh no oh no— “

This way,” Marie said immediately, already moving, voice calm. “He’ll go toward the light. He’ll go toward the fire.”

They found him quickly, slowly but steadily approaching the bonfire. He stopped when he saw the flames, staring up at them with an expression Julien hadn’t seen in months. And for a brief, piercing moment, his face cleared.

“Nadau,” he said. “My father brought me. I brought Julien. I remember.”

Julien felt the moment expand—and then slip away.

“Where’s Julien?” his father asked. “He should be here.”

“I’m here, Papa,” Julien said, voice unsteady.

“Good,” his father said, patting his arm. “Is there soup?”

“Yes, Papa. There’s soup. Let’s get you some.”

Later, much later, after they’d gotten his father home and settled, Marie and Julien sat on his front steps, sharing what was left of the Tursan, watching smoke still rising from the hill.

“I can’t do this anymore,” Julien said quietly. “I love him. I do. Mon Dieu, I do. But I’m exhausted.”

“I know. The solution’s name is Véronique Mercier. She does respite care. Professional, experienced. I’m texting you her number. Not expensive if you qualify for the departmental subsidy, which I’m sure you do.”

“Marie—”

“You know what my mother said when she still could speak? When she still had words? ‘Get help before you hate me.’ She was right. You can’t care for someone if you’re destroyed by caring for them. Accept it. Accept help. Or you’ll break, and then where will he be?”

Julien looked at Véronique’s number glowing on his phone screen. “D’accord,” he said. “Okay. I’ll call her.”

The Making of Friends and Maintaining of Friendships Master Plan

In a world filled with distractions, one of the most meaningful gifts you can offer a friend is your full presence. Being present isn’t about doing or saying the “right” thing—it’s about showing up fully, with an open heart and undivided attention.

When you’re truly present, you create a safe space for your friend to share their thoughts, fears, and joys. It’s in these moments of deep connection that friendships grow stronger. This holiday season, give the gift of your presence. Turn off your phone, silence the noise, and simply be there.

Presence is also a gift you can give yourself. When you slow down and embrace the moment, you’ll find clarity and peace, even amid life’s transitions.

Today, stop pretending you can handle everything on your own. You can’t. Nobody can. Worst case scenario: You admit you need help, feel vulnerable, and discover the world doesn’t end when you’re not controlling everything yourself. Best case scenario: Your childhood friend who survived her own caregiving crisis shows up with wine and a terrifying amount of competence, systematically dismantles two weeks of your anxiety with six phone calls, connects you with respite care you didn’t know existed, and forces you to ask for help with the village fire festival. You discover that asking for help isn’t a weakness—it’s the thing that keeps you alive and functional and able to actually care for the people who need you. You learn that community tradition exists not just to preserve memory but to share burden, that fire spreads from hill to hill because it’s meant to be collective light not individual responsibility, and that the friends who refuse to let you collapse quietly are the ones who understand that caring for others requires letting others care for you, even when guilt and pride say you should do it all alone.

What does being present mean to you? How can you practice presence in your friendships this season?

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