Name Day

A Christian friend of mine at the Patent Office wished me a happy name day today. I don’t usually keep track, but I did tell her years ago, when she wished me a happy name day, about the months I spent in an an English school in 1973, while my father was teaching at Cambridge for a term, and we were living in a village near the university town, Little Shelford. It wasn’t all bad, but as a stranger and an American, I didn’t fit in, and was targeted by at least one bully, so I was glad when my time there was up. My last day in school was Saint Nicholas’s Day, and my Christian friend thinks that getting me out may have been a minor miracle of Saint Nicholas of Myra.

Who knows, it could be true. Anyway, happy name day to all the other Nicholases of the world.