St Nicholas Day, 19 December 2005

A happy St Nicholas Day to every house with a child in it.

This is the first year I have paid proper attention to this day, and I got it wrong initially. I assumed it was a warm-up for the main event — a smaller gift now, the real one later.

It is not. In most households here it is the children's holiday, and the winter ones that follow belong more to the adults: the long table, the twelve dishes, the guests, the ceremony. This is the one that is entirely for them, and the scale of it is deliberately small so that it stays that way.

A gift under a pillow at dawn is not a lesser version of anything. It is a well-designed holiday that has never needed improving.

A good morning to your household tomorrow.