Far better to receive socks than some depersonalised present from Kris Kindle

IRECENTLY visited a fellow writer whom I’ve known for many years, who lives out in the country. He met me at the front gate and, as we were going around the house to his workroom, I couldn’t help noticing a massive pile of logs piled up against the gable. Since I have a wood-burning stove in my own place in Sligo, the question of firestuff is never far from my thoughts. I often find myself buying – randomly – firebags, firelogs, briquettes, bags of turf, coal and kindling from petrol stations and the like. I sometimes buy bags of logs as well, but find these bad value: one decent fire and you’re down to burning the bag.

I remarked on the amount of timber he had in and he said it was a present from a reader who had liked his latest book so much he insisted on sending around a trailerload of blocks.

Now that’s what I call a present – or what a late uncle of mine would have called a ‘horrid present’. It’s useful, saves time and hassle, and allows you to enjoy the fire without feeling you have to go easy. I wished I could write books that would inspire men in this direction.

It got me to thinking about Christmas presents, bang on cue. As I’ve written here before, my favourite part of Christmas is the period beforehand: the three weeks of pre-Christmas flurry, when there’s a buzz around the place and everyone’s out with a purpose. I play a game with myself every year, listening for the first person to bemoan the ‘ commercialisation’ of Christmas, and the ignoring of its ‘ real meaning’. I was thinking of carrying a special gift around with me and presenting it to this lucky soul the minute she or he comes out with it.

I love the ‘commercialisation of Christmas’. Though somewhat different from the vibe of 2,000 years ago, the epidemic of crazed consumerism in its way helps to regenerate the magic we associate with these dying breaths of the year.

I’ve never been able to see how you could disentangle the crib from the Christmas lights, or Midnight Mass from Santa’s grotto, or the Wise Kings from Morecambe and Wise – they’re all of a piece for me, a piece which goes to the core of the meaning of these enchanting days.

Similarly, buying presents for people. It’s right up there at the top of the meaning-of-Christmas tree: the symbolic acts of giving and receiving, which I’m convinced contribute to the maintenance of our capacity for altruism at other times.

HOWEVER superficial the ‘gifting’ process may seem, it makes us pause and look more closely at one another and consider our mutual ticking mechanisms. It reminds us that it really is better to give than to receive. And it draws us into conspiracies of secrecy that are invigorated with a delight that sometimes becomes indistinguishable from love. But, let’s be honest, most of what we buy each other usually falls far short of what we think of one another.

Let’s be even more honest: most of it is out-and-out rubbish that we know will go straight up in the attic unless it’s adaptable enough for regifting.

Isn’t that odd: that you can know someone well, talk with them all the time, and yet, when you’re required to encapsulate your relationship in an object/thing, you haven’t a clue?

There’s no real fault in it. Most of us just don’t think about most other people in that way.

It’s the hardest thing, buying for others. If someone is ‘big into’ something – painting or golf, for instance – they already have all the gear. If they’re readers, it’s hard to find a book they’ve missed; if they’re not readers, there’s no point in buying them books. I try to identify someone’s passions, but that’s risky unless you’re actually living with them.

The chances are you won’t have sufficient insight into their obsession to get them something they haven’t already either acquired or rejected out of hand.

Someone asked me lately what to give someone who already had, or could buy, anything he needed. I suggested a book by an author she herself liked, or a CD by some band she’d love to turn the world on to. That way, you’re giving far more than an object – a touch of your own passion, the chance of opening up an new seam of discovery, with your personal guarantee. A gift beyond all price tags.

It may sound like the dad who buys a train-set for his son so he can play with it himself, but I think there’s a merit in giving people something you’ve absolutely loved – provided you also give them permission to hate it, and tell you exactly why.

Rarely do they come back with the response you’re hoping for, but I often find that the argument that follows is the best part of the present – for both of us.

I’m not into all this Kris Kindle palaver, which takes all the fun out of it in the name of sparing expense. I’d prefer an empty box to a depersonalised present from someone selected by plebiscite to buy it for me – and who’s getting his own present from a brother-inlaw he’s met twice when both of them were half-locked.

THESE days I get asked: ‘What would you like?’ A surprise, I always say, which people never seem to find helpful. In truth, I’d much prefer to get socks, gloves or a scarf than something that I ordered myself and recognise from the shape of the parcel before I open it.

And what’s wrong with socks? A man can never have enough. Or gloves, for that matter, which I rarely wear, but only because I always lose them. Scarves are risky as presents, but can become beloved given the right weather.

Three years ago, when it snowed for several weeks pre-Christmas, there was a brief period when you could break with your normal personality and bring out all the exotic scarves, hats and waterproof footwear you’d been hiding away in your bottom drawers or under the bed.

After fighting it awhile, we decided to take the snow as a dispensation to do as little as possible and to act as if our excuse was self-evident – which, for once, it was. Suddenly, it became acceptable to make a statement in Technicolor about how your personality had been modified by the weather, and people went around wearing stuff that might otherwise have ended up in Oxfam after their funerals. I even bought myself a pair of blue boots, which will require one helluva blizzard before I’ll chance wearing them. Still, I live in hope, which after all is the real meaning of Christmas.