At this time of year I often peer into store windows for clues to what I should feel. Standing before a winter wonderland scene of wicker deer and frosted apples, assorted miniature wassailers in bobble hats and tartan, all set against snow-dusted spruce intertwined with fairy lights (and in the background the heroic figure of Santa, ho-ho-ho-ing a bit too strenuously in the face of untold strain), well — it can help you make believe that all is right with the world. Or right-ish.

Loiter a minute more and a familiar mixture of anxiety and longing will arise, heralding the realization that you’re a festive athlete in preparation, and over the coming weeks every ounce of your strength and moral energy is going be summoned. It could end with one of those sore throats that feels as if you have swallowed a pair of nail scissors. So, yes, you’d better watch out.

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I don’t know where I stand in relation to Christmas anymore. I love it, and would do anything for it, but I can’t help feeling it wants my blood. Like a withholding father in a novel by Henry James, it may not be satisfied with my very best efforts. It doesn’t help, of course, that I still nurse idiotic beliefs about the season, including the tenet that good presents transform lives, and unless you do a specific placement for the parcels in the six stockings you fill (creating meaningful contrasts and crescendos), you have not tried.