Today is December 6th, known in some European
countries as St. Nicholas day. Growing
up in Germany and Belgium, we always put our shoes outside the door in
anticipation of what St. Nicholas (or Sint Niklaas) would leave us. I remember in Germany; chocolate coins and
eggs tied to a small branch, standing in my siblings’ and my sneakers at 6:30
on those cold, winter mornings. In
Belgium, since we were getting older and our feet were bigger, St. Niklaas
would shove a Toblerone or a Cote d’ Or chocolate bar down our shoes.
All these years later, across an ocean, St. Nicholas has
found our house in Northern Virginia. We
have modified the legend of St. Nicholas (some would say bastardized it, but I
refuse to use such language when referring to Christmas legends). For us, St. Nicholas is a revered old man,
with the same magic as Santa. He works
alongside, but independently of Santa, leaving treats for those who are good
and switches and rocks (Max doesn’t really understand coal yet) for those who
are naughty. What he leaves you can be
seen as something of a bellwether for how you will fare on December 24th,
and gives you a little time to be extra special good if things don’t look too
promising. For a hilarious, twisted, yet
still fairly accurate telling of St. Nicholas traditions, check out this story,
Six to Eight Black Men, by David Sedaris.
Max woke up this morning, and said, “Let’s see if St. Nick
came!” As a parent, that’s the
payoff. We went downstairs and checked
their sneakers. St. Nicholas left Max
and Sam both sweets and sticks. At first
Max only saw the sticks. I didn’t think
it was possible for his face to get that long.
Sam found his little gold-wrapped chocolate bear, took it out, and threw
it on the floor. I think that the
message the sticks were supposed to send may have gotten lost once the
chocolate was discovered.
haha I can just see his little face in disbelief! I remember putting our shoes out in Germany! Thank you for bringing back those memories. Although, Ed and I never got toblerone..we got apples and oranges.
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