The Snow-Dome

The day was cold and miserable and I wanted cheering up, so I got out s bottle of mulled wine. I poured myself a big glassful and replaced the stopper. There was s little dome on top of the cork, and inside stood an effigy of Father Christmas, surrounded by snow, very pure white snow, not like the slush that was out in the streets.
Well, the wine did its job. In a few minutes I felt happy and relaxed. But then an extraordinary thing happened. The snow-dome seemed to grow, and - you may say that the candlelight was glinting on it but I could have sworn to you that Father Christmas winked at me.
After that, more strange things took place. The plastic cover melted into thin air, Santa grew, and then he held out his hand and said, "Hello."
"Hello, Father Christmas," I stammered.
He smiled reassuringly. "You're going to be my friend. Please call me Nicholas - that's my real name. Now listen. Hold my hand tight. I'm going to take you on an exciting journey."
So I did. Well, what would you have done? The house walls melted away like the snow-dome had done, and suddenly we were flying - yes, flying - and there were no pavements, no slush, no lights, no cars, no aeroplanes, just sea.
Presently we touched down in a strange country, somewhere in the Middle East, I supposed. It was a village, a very poor village by the looks of things. All the houses were built of baked mud, and it looked very primitive. There were no cars or television aerials to be seen. Cattle wandered about in the streets, which were only dirt tracks, and the ground was dusty and dry. But then I noticed, coming towards us, three beautiful young women, swarthy, black-haired and dressed in fine clothes and pretty jewellery. Their demeanour was modest and yet they stood tall and looked radiantly happy.
"You see those girls?" Nicholas said to me. "They wanted to get married - to some fine young men, I may say - but they had no dowry. I had some money so I gave it to them and look at them now! Three sisters, all brides on the same day."
"But why, Nicholas? What's in it for you? And" (I added in astonishment) "why are you wearing those robes and that mitre? You look like a bishop all of a sudden."
He smiled at me but did not answer straight away. Instead he gripped my hand and off we flew AGAIN!
"I want you to see my master now," he explained. "My master had very little money, and yet he gave everything he had."
We landed again, in a small town full of domed houses, also made of baked mud. It was set in the midst of some rocky, hilly land where scrawny sheep were grazing. My companion took me to the entrance of a sort of cave.
"Look at this," he whispered. "My master!"
Well, I could just about pick out a scruffy-looking couple sitting in the gloom. The man had his arm around his wife's waist. She looked tired. In front of them was a very new baby lying in some hay, as if they couldn't afford a proper cot for him. "Master," I thought, "what master?" And then I watched Nicholas put his mitre down on that dirty floor and kneel - before the BABY ...
My friend got up and beckoned me out. "Do you realise," he said, with a new light in his eyes, "that when he grows up he's going to save the world?" Nicholas waved his arm around him. "This place is full of angels. You can't see them, I can tell from your face, but in a while those shepherds on that hill will see them and they'll come rushing over here."
Soon we were floating over the sea again. "You must tell people about that baby," said my companion. "You needn't tell them about me and that peasant family in Turkey with the three daughters. I just did what any decent person would do. The question is, what are YOU going to do?"
To cut a long story short, that afternoon I found myself back in my warm living-room. Father Christmas, red-suited, stood encased in his snow-dome atop the wine-bottle, as before. Outside the cars sloshed by in the dusk, streetlights glinting on their windscreens. Families and knots of teenagers tramped past, bearing armfuls of shopping and chattering, laughing and swearing. That was a funny dream, I thought. I must have dozed off, or maybe it was the drink. Perhaps I will give up alcohol in the new year.
Yet I couldn't throw off those words: "What are you going to do?" What, indeed?
And that, folks, is why I opened this soup-kitchen.