December

THE FEAST OF MIDWINTER, by whatever name we call it – Christmas, Hannukah, winter solstice – marks the time when the year turns, a time of change, for contemplation as well as celebration, a time to remember the past and hope for the future.

It’s no accident that whenever we gather together at such a time we look back to the good things we remember from childhood. What we look for on the table is exactly what we ate last year and the year before that. If the cook decides to change the menu, there must be a very good reason. And the reason can very well be a change of place. When my own four children were small, Christmas happened wherever we found ourselves, which might just as well have been a remote valley in Andalusia as a windy plateau of the Languedoc or the wilds of Wales. Other years we found ourselves in the hills of Tuscany or the uplands of Provence or the islands of the Hebrides. One particularly, memorable year, when my eldest was courting the young woman who later became his bride, we spent it in clapboard splendour in the elegant Hamptons on Long Island.