On my way back from the village early yesterday evening, I met a neighbour who asked wasn’t I staying around for the Kings’ Day cavalcade.
The usual conversation resulted, about the Kings as gift-bearers not being part of my culture. (“We do things differently en mi tierra,” is a useful gambit which usually puts paid to criticism of my unorthodox behaviours. After all, I can’t help being foreign.)
Then I asked whether he was intending to watch the parade. “Oh no; es para niños.”
Well, I’m not a niña and I didn’t see the parade this year; and although I have too many pairs of shoes scattered around the house to have checked them all, I’m fairly sure the Kings didn’t bring me anything.
But in recognition of all the children who have received their Christmas toys today, I’ve started this post with a photograph of Dobbin. He’s a 1950’s Mobo walking horse of the type described by Kate Atkinson in Behind the Scenes at the Museum as “perhaps the most handsome creature ever manufactured by man”.
One day, I hope to rescue him from his current attic stable and bring him to a sunny country where he won’t rust any more.
don't confuse the narrator 