{"id":150,"date":"2011-12-12T17:32:10","date_gmt":"2011-12-12T16:32:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hilarymoriarty.com\/blog\/?p=150"},"modified":"2011-12-12T17:32:10","modified_gmt":"2011-12-12T16:32:10","slug":"card-tricks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/?p=150","title":{"rendered":"Card tricks"},"content":{"rendered":"

So here we are, \u2018Merry Christmas, everybody\u2019s having fun.\u2019 And sure as the tannoys start broadcasting an unrelenting diet of \u2018Christmassy\u2019 music and the tills start ringing \u2013 do they still do that? \u2013 for the annual spending splurge of everyone on the planet buying a present for at least half a dozen people, so the cards will arrive.
\nAnd what, we may ask, is the semiology of Christmas cards?
\nA Christmas card is surely not just a Christmas card: it signifies.\u00a0 It\u2019s quite exhausting contemplating how much.
\nStart at home, with your own cards \u2013 and some of the questions here can then be multiplied up to schools, and possibly other or associated businesses also.
\nFor instance, are you still sending them at all?\u00a0 Stamps are becoming eye-wateringly expensive, even at second class \u2013 think of your mum and dad, if they are alive ask them if they ever thought they would spend ten bob on a first class stamp.\u00a0 The younger generation is highly likely to send universal emails and post no cards at all.\u00a0 And there may be a group at the borders of the card-sending generation \u2013 \u2018Of course!\u2019 \u2013 and the one that doesn\u2019t \u2013 \u2018Of course not!\u2019 \u2013 where annual decisions are made about which generation to mimic.\u00a0 \u2018Are you still sending cards? How quaint! \u2019 Yes, I can hear that at dinner parties in the city, if not actually in the shires.
\nIf you\u2019ve always sent them, and suddenly don\u2019t, friends may think you\u2019re dead, so probably in your first non-send year you will need to warn people of your new resolution \u2013 and that might as well be a card, mightn\u2019t it?\u00a0 Getting clear of them could take some time.
\nSo let\u2019s assume you do send them.\u00a0 Large? Small ?\u00a0 Last Christmas I saw cards for which the envelopes were barely big enough to carry the stamp as well as the address.\u00a0 They looked faintly like the mini-books the Brontes produced, but less interesting.
\nReligious or not?\u00a0 There is hardly time in an article like this to consider what \u2018or not\u2019 may embrace: everything from robins to post boxes, Santas to sleighs, vague messages about peace to endless fir trees, bauble or snow-clad, and \u2013 inexplicably \u2013 coaches and fours galloping through snowy villages in some nineteenth century image suggesting, \u00a0\u2018I\u2019ll be home for Christmas. . .\u2019
\nEven religious cards come in endless permutations: Madonnas with babies, stables, shepherds with and without sheep, three kings on camels. We had two last year with just sheep on the front, looking suspiciously as if they might be in the Cotswolds, but the associative message still has resonance, even if you are left to yourself to provide the back story.
\nFor each card, the recipient could be \u2018reading\u2019 a meaning beyond the fact that you remember them fondly.\u00a0 If robins, are you agnostic?\u00a0 If a religious card, are you actually a church member, if so which one?\u00a0 Unless of course the recipient is Nigella Lawson, who famously admitted on TV to opening her cards standing over a bin, into which the card fell once read.\u00a0 Not for her the \u2018Ah, look, nice card from Auntie Flo!\u2019 moment with cards festooning the mantelpiece.\u00a0 She explained her cavalier attitude to the greetings cards as a defence of her d\u00e9cor \u2013 \u2018They chose this, that\u2019s their taste, not necessarily mine.\u00a0 I don\u2019t choose to have my home filled with examples of other people\u2019s taste.\u2019
\nPerhaps the last layer for the personal card is the question: is it a charity card? And if so, do you really support it, or did you just like the card?\u00a0 We may be revealing much in such a choice \u2013 or, of course, nothing at all \u2013 \u2018I just liked the cute teddy bear in the stocking!\u2019
\nHow much more is at stake for a school sendiing Christmas cards.\u00a0 Most schools doing so acknowledge the card\u2019s importance as a marketing tool.\u00a0 These cards offer the world a \u2018picture\u2019 of the school which will be displayed on mantelpieces (pace<\/em> Nigella) for possibly a month, given the early December break-up date of most independent schools.\u00a0 Magic!
\nSo how best to \u2018represent\u2019 the school to the outside world?
\nOne way is having the art work done by a pupil, who is named inside and whose relatives can buy hundreds to keep forever.\u00a0 Many schools will run competitions in the autumn term to provide the card design.\u00a0 Mostly it\u2019s painted, but increasingly photographers are popping up with snowy scenes, if not Santas, to show the diversity of what the school\u2019s art department does.
\nBut what to paint?\u00a0 Sometimes it\u2019s a view of the school.\u00a0 Seldom is it a Madonna or a stable, and if it is it\u2019s likely to be a primary or prep school child who paints it, but three kings have potential.\u00a0 And often it\u2019s some abstract but appropriate image and message \u2013 candle, dove, peace – for our increasingly secular times, when the school is inclusive of pupils of all faiths and none.
\nPhotographers may find a school event upon which to focus \u2013 easier now than it would have been twenty years ago because so many people and school marketing departments\u00a0 take photos all the time.\u00a0 When someone in September asks, \u2018Have you got a photo of the school in the snow – remember, that one day in February?\u2019 such a photo will appear on your computer within the hour. \u00a0Or a shot of the Carol Service \u2013 all reverence and twinkling candles, or of the choir, or one angelic boy soprano standing alone, probably in white and scarlet, in a fabulous cathedral shortly to be filled with his soaring voice.
\nCharity card or not?\u00a0 If a charity card, you will lose the personal touch of the vision of the school, its buildings, its pupils, its extensive curriculum, but\u00a0 possibly gain in the statement of what you support (and if you do, should it be a different charity every year, and how do you choose it \u2013 by popular vote? By senior management discussion, by Head\u2019s decree?)
\nA notable addition to the range of charities represented on the Moriarty mantelpiece in 2011 (and not discarded until Twelfth Night) was Help for Heroes, a charity which has expanded its operations to include greetings cards.\u00a0 It\u2019s a charity which has been much-supported by schools \u2013 I wonder how many made it their charity of choice for the cards?\u00a0 If so, it would be a development \u2013 \u00a0until recently, I would have thought children\u2019s charities more likely to benefit from schools\u2019 patronage.
\nOf course, if making a charitable donation instead of sending cards at all \u2013 whether personally or on behalf of the school \u2013 really puts your money where your sentiments suggest.\u00a0 And if you did, you\u2019d want people to know, so you\u2019d be sending texts and emails explaining what you have done \u2013 you see? You are younger than you thought.
\nSave the planet not using the paper, save money not posting them, save the time of writing and addressing them, save the risk of having your choice \u2018misread\u2019 \u2013 \u2018Well I think that school looks like a prison!\u2019 – save a child or a tiger\u00a0 or help a hero instead.
\nEither way, I think I see change coming.\u00a0 You could say, it\u2019s on the cards.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So here we are, \u2018Merry Christmas, everybody\u2019s having fun.\u2019 And sure as the tannoys start broadcasting an unrelenting diet of \u2018Christmassy\u2019 music and the tills start ringing \u2013 do they still do that? \u2013 for the annual spending splurge of everyone on the planet buying a present for at least half a dozen people, so\u2026 Read More »<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,13],"tags":[60,61],"class_list":["post-150","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ie-today","category-independent-education-today","tag-christmas","tag-christmas-cards"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=150"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}