The paradox of Christmas is what makes it so compelling

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The author is the author of fiction, cookbooks and poetry collections. his The latest book is ‘The Dinner Table’, a collection of food writings

There is something paradoxical about Christmas. Perhaps this is the whole god-child business; Perhaps it is the pagan light-dark dichotomy. Perhaps it’s the way we inexplicably cram the hibernation season with more social engagement than the previous 11 months. Perhaps the escapist nature of that thing is only possible because we cannot escape it. This is my revelation of the year: I’m only great at Christmas because I’m so bad at Christmas.

I start thinking about it early, like October: buying something pretty for the tree, looking at ribbons, considering my theme (!). I always have a tree and usually one too big for the space we live in. There are two wicker hampers that sit on a high shelf, and I begin to imagine opening them as daylight begins to accumulate: the minute, essentially, I begin to succumb to the year’s sadness.

Like many, my instincts are for avoidance and seasonal affective disorder. I’d be fine if I were a bear (salmon sashimi; long naps), but instead I’m one big and boisterous family man. We have traditions to uphold! Must be the place! See people! I have a lot to do for hibernation to be a viable option.

Also, I’d miss it. I had a few years of, for various reasons, horribly bad Decembers and I still couldn’t help myself: mince pies in the hospital lobby, miniature plants on clean critical care windowsills, mini scalpels making advent calendars on the ward floor and some Pret sticks. The year the world stopped and it might be possible to skip the whole thing, I ate caviar and crisps in the bath and watched carol Alone on Christmas Eve: Festive, joyful, and the only way to descend into a complete pit of doom.

Christmas cannot be ignored. The alternative is not a pure bear lifestyle: the alternative is peat.

Which is why, I guess, if I had a house fire I might consider grabbing the Christmas box first. Nowhere else in my life had I created such sophisticated defenses against the dark: velvet ribbons of six different shades, cane angels, frozen Indian baubles as big as two fists and as small as marbles. A polished goat bone hoop and some polished stained glass. Miniatures of all kinds: toasters, toucans, tinned fish and — fresh from the National Theatre’s new production — glass ballet shoes glittering on taffeta ribbons.

These pieces I’ve stored up against my doom, by which I mean, the reality of what’s upon us now: canceled catsitters, uncomfortable Secret Santas, misunderstood or underappreciated loneliness, constant loneliness, last-minute deadlines, delayed trains, baggage. Allowances, burnt beef, busy motorways, quarreling families, driving rain, darkness, trauma, excessive talking, an inadequate return on effort and the imminence of income tax.

As my mother likes to say (in one of many family traditions) and quotes the mother of her teenage boyfriend’s childhood next-door neighbor: How was Christmas? Oh, you know: a few rows and a few mistakes. These things, or some of them, are inevitable.

And yet, other things may also be inevitable. If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em: If you can’t escape fromrun away fromor in.

There is a technique for calming panic attacks that relies on the patient carefully observing their surroundings through the prism of their senses: five things you can see, four things you can hear, three things you can touch, two things you can smell, one Things you can taste.

This is helpful almost all the time, but it’s especially good now. The paradox of Christmas is really that it has to contain everything at once, which makes it so compelling: joy, pain, loss, longing, the big sandwich. It turns your life into a microscope and a magnifying glass, as you live it.

Such high-intensity dominance can really only be balanced by careful observation of detail: Spin and shine, for example, a purple glass garlic bulb on a fine gold thread; woodcut interior of an Angela Harding advent calendar; Demerara sugar glaze on a star-topped mince pie. Netflix’s cheerful pink crackle 4K Birchwood Fireplace for Your Home: Crackling Edition. Easy-pillar bowl. A quality street rug under the coffee table. A paper hat is being torn around someone’s uncle’s huge head. The brevity of the day once it begins. Leftovers at midnight. Joy, wherever it is found, and wherever it is dark.