Nothing in the diary? Now's the time to start keeping a daily one My diary is no dazzler, but it is a relief valve, a place to siphon off and spit out and seethe and soothe and settle scores 29 December 2020 • 6:00am Over Christmas I unwrapped a new diary and a 2021 calendar. A different Dutch flower painting for every month of the year. Presents, kindly meant, but feeling just now like a rotten joke. So far I’ve put in a friend’s wedding, postponed from September – and that’s as much as I can muster. This time of year is usually lovely and longed-for. Hunker down and cuddle up. After a December of office parties, carol concerts, nativity plays and all the family gang together, it’s a blessing, really, in the shortest, darkest days of the year, to nest, read and potter.