Tactful omissions: 1. Little white lies

Yesterday I got a text from a friend asking whether I had a copy of Julian Barnes’ The Sense of an Ending. I do. ‘I thought you probably would,’ he replied. ‘My brother-in-law gave me a copy for Christmas and he was so pleased to have chosen it I didn’t have the heart to tell him I already had it.’

My family does not understand these social mores. On Christmas Day the Impster rips open a present to discover a book she already has. Her face falls.

‘Well I've already got that one,’ she says. ‘We must tell Aunty Katy and she can get me something else.’

Tricky lesson number one: always tell the truth, but not necessarily at Christmas.

K and I discuss and differ.

Him: Lying is never right.

Me: Of course it's the right thing to do if it spares somebody's feelings. It’s called diplomacy and basic good manners.

Him: There’s never any need to tell a white lie. Anyway, who are you lying to? Either you're with a friend who should want to know the truth, or you’re with people who aren't your friends so it doesn't matter if you tell them the truth. In any case, people almost never ask for a direct opinion.

(Just shows he doesn’t work in publishing. I’m paid to say what I think of people’s writing every day. Perhaps that explains why I’m so preoccupied with the problem of kind rejections. Bat them away with enough force that they’ll never come back, but so softly they don’t feel the blow.)

Me: What about work colleagues?

Him: They can know the truth.

Me: And your boss?

Him: Definitely, that's what he's paying me for.

(Here’s a man who has never worried about his employment. For a heartbeat I am proud. Then somewhat nervous.)

Me: What about your mother's friends then?

Him: Avoid talking to them! You don't want to put yourself in a difficult situation, now do you?

He is direct in manner but with a tendency to skirt around tricky issues. Yes, K – like many men - has perfected the art of the tactful omission. I cottoned onto this about twelve years ago with the result that these days I’m more interested in what I’m not being told. So generally, it doesn’t work out quite as well for him as it used to.

But it does beg the question: what is the difference between telling only part of the truth and telling a white lie? If someone gives you a present you already have and you say, ‘How thoughtfully chosen,’ is this a white lie? It’s partly true, but what you really mean is that they’ve thought about it and have got it so right it’s wrong.

I believe in white lies, as much as white Christmases. As if proof of their value were needed, a friend gave the Impster a coat. It was a bit small. She is a very good friend, and the words of my beloved were still ringing in my ears. So I told her the truth and said that we loved it, but if she still had the receipt the next size would get more wear. She didn’t have the receipt and instead bought another coat. I now feel like the biggest ingrate the world has ever seen. I should have had enough heart for a little white lie, or at least to tactfully omit the truth.

What Christmas looks like

Thursday: a man is walking towards me as I run down a muddy track. He is dark and thick set and he looks like he wants to kill someone. Then around the bend appear four children walking with their mother. She looks like she wants to kill someone. Oh dear, I think, Christmas holidays.

Friday: my beautiful goddaughter is hanging a gingerbread family on our tree (a few limbs go missing). My children are playing a raucous game of 'touching the ceiling' with her father. Outside on the drive K's car is drawing up. He is home early and we are all excited. Oh good, I think, Christmas holidays.

Saturday: a little sequined angel is standing at the front of the church, holding hands with a littler shepherd clutching his toy lamb. The angel is singing Away in a Manger and is protecting the shepherd from stampeding wise men. A young couple steal a kiss as they leave the church. Oh good, I think, Christmas love.

Sunday: four wide eyes, sparkling with excitement as wrapping paper is ripped open and presents are shared. K is carving a five bird roast, symbol of generosity and greed. Oh dear, I think, for what we are about to receive I feel horribly guilty.

Monday: two people standing by a fire on their allotment, which gives me a warm cold feeling as I run past. The owner of a local wine bar walking his dog waves hello (and I resolve to drink less next year). More people walking in ever stranger familial formations. A waterlogged nature reserve, with up-tailed ducks searching for morsels. Two planes flying overhead, uniting and dividing a couple of hundred families. The world's coolest parents on rollerblades, teaching their youngest of three how to skate. Darkness descending as I reach home, but on the front lawn two bright white doves shine out. Oh good, I think, Christmas peace.

The littlest things

I've been making little mistakes, like forgetting to attach the email attachment, and bigger mistakes like wrapping up the wrong present. I don't usually make mistakes like these but perhaps its not surprising. I am exhausted. There are also six birthdays in December and I have been up until one wrapping.

During the wrapping session I am also on the phone finalising birthday party preparations.

'I've got the parental champagne,' I say, 'and I just need to sort parental nibbles.'

'Great! I've hired a helium canister,' says my friend.

'Goodness,' I say, 'You've thought of everything.'

'Actually I feel like my head is about to explode,' she says.

This is exactly the feeling I have. This is Christmas.

'I'm sorry to sound like a moaning 70s housewife,' she says, 'but I think men think that Christmas just happens.'

When I was a child, my mother drove us insane. She'd make three puddings and complain about all the work she had to do, and we'd say, 'But you only needed to make one,' and she'd say, 'Well I like everyone to have their favourite.'

Looking back, I think she achieved the miracle of Christmas by never sleeping. The house was always full of happy people and wonderful cooking smells and a matriarch who had been making lists for a month and had thought of everything.

This year I only started feeling Christmassy yesterday. I like to be in the kitchen cooking, I like a houseful of people (lots of whom must be chocolate-stealing children), I like to have choral music in the background, I like a church service, I like lots of fairy lights, I like the smell of a real pine-needle-dropping tree, I like lots of booze, and giving beautiful things.

Christmas is a million little things. It's the things that make your head almost explode. But as my mother taught us, it's the thought that counts.

Rate your Santa

Dear Father Christmas

It isn't often that I write letters of complaint - and perhaps my thirty-something years should have made me world-weary enough to let this pass - but I can't help thinking that it's not too late. With a few pointers there is still time before Christmas to keep the magic alive for hundreds of other girls and boys.

You might think that I'm not your target audience, but as one who paid your £5.50 entrance fee on Tuesday you would be wrong. I don't expect you to be RADA trained, just convincing enough so that a three year old can't see right through you.

It has to be said that you've got a lot going for you – the willing suspension of disbelief has already been created. Most performers don't have the benefit of such a receptive audience, but unfortunately this comes with a certain level of expectation. I've spent a long time building you up, and you've got a great back story, lots of magic powers (always sells), a warm and jolly persona and a fine intellect to match. You can break and enter into any house without chimney, and best of all, you are the image of selfless and bountiful giving. What I'm trying to say is that you're trading on an elaborate cultural lie and your job is to enhance it. The last thing we want is to tell our children the truth, or who can say where it will end?

Allow me to enter into specifics:

1. Your 'grotto' was frankly grotty and your 'elf' was entirely without any elfin features (a hat and rosy cheeks really would make all the difference. The diet can wait until January).

2. £5.50 for a five minute interview and a tube of bubbles did not leave me feeling bountiful and full of festive cheer.

3. I didn’t see a list of your convictions pinned up outside, so you really didn't need to discuss your CRB checks with us at such length, nor launch a tirade on taxi drivers the world over who do not require such paperwork. The Impster was totally befuddled, but mercifully on this occasion was sufficiently distracted not to request her customary chapter and verse explanation.

4. Your parting shot should not be 'Goodbye! If you liked it, Merry Christmas, and if not you can see Santa at Debenhams.'

5. Don't ask a three year old the kind of question that would fox an adult. They are probably feeling rather shy and in awe of you (particularly in light of your passionate feelings regarding the necessary police checks) so starting a conversation with 'Now how many reindeer do I have?' won't put anyone at their ease.

6. I know that in this era of globalisation it’s probably harder to get your story straight, but you really should decide on where you live and stick to it: is it the North Pole, Greenland or Lapland? It doesn't help to give the impression of being hazy about geography when you have to cover the world in a single night.

I don't mean to be picky, but it is clear that you are not a man who enjoys his work. Perhaps you dislike children? Or consider parental expectations to be wildly excessive these days?

Anyway, you can take heart from the fact that the Impster still thinks you were 'better than the Father Christmas with the bell' who was outside the cathedral last week. I, too, was unconvinced by the cut of his jib. There is something altogether wrong about a skinny Father Christmas (though that is one accusation I would not lay at your door).

Well, I wish you the very best of luck for the remaining festive season, and let us sincerely hope you find more satisfying employment in the New Year. Should you wish to persevere with this career path, please don’t hesitate to contact me. I am now actively engaged in launching The Father Christmas Consultancy in time for next Christmas.

All best wishes


This Father Christmas was found in his Ice Cave at the Winchester Cathedral Christmas Market. If you've had an encounter with a good, bad or indifferent Father Christmas this year then please leave a comment about it.

By the way, as long as you’re not too fussy about where your letter ends up, little people can write to Santa Claus, Reindeer Land, SAN TA1 and the Royal Mail will try their best to deliver it in a timely fashion. (Just for the record, the real Father Christmas lives in the mountains of Korvatunturi in the Finnish province of Lapland but then you have to rely on the chimney method of delivery which is somewhat fraught with hazards.)

Also, don’t forget you can track his movements around the world on Christmas Eve here (they need Disney or Nintendo on the case with their animation but it’s clever enough to impress a three year old).

Merry Christmas one and all!

May cause offence

It is bath time. I am kneeling devoutly by the side of the bath, engaged in the ritual practice of extracting the Boo’s fingers from the tap. Suddenly the Impster pops up holding her watering can and sponge. ‘Blood of Christ?’ she asks proffering the watering can.

‘What?’

‘I’m playin’ churches,’ she explains. Then picking up the sponge, she hollers loud enough to shame a barrow-boy, ‘Anyone want some body of Christ?’

The Boo looks suitably impressed and flaps his arms as if to say, ‘Don’t mind if I do.’

It started one evening way past her bedtime. K told her she could choose ‘just one’ book for her bedtime story. So she chose the fattest one she could find: The Bible. They embarked on Genesis and she pointed to the picture of Noah on the opposite page: ‘Look daddy, it’s the Fat Controller.’ It was clear that we had a little explaining to do.

Or at least someone did. The following week she started Sunday School and came home full of it: ‘I thought it was horrid. I wanted to draw pictures of wicked witches.’

Perhaps it was the post-Sunday School chocolate digestives that eased the way, or possibly her recent discovery that Holy Communion contained edible goods: ‘Daddy, did you get something to eat?’

Six months later, she has started spreading the word. ‘I like Church,’ she said trudging along the other Sunday. ‘I wonder if granny knows about Church?’ And lo and behold as we are taking our leave of my parents she says, ‘I’ll watch out for you granny, and God will watch out for me. God is at Church.’

No evangelist, however good, can match the charming yet obsessional fervour of a three year old. How otherwise could Disney and Barbie continue to practise their strangulating hold on families the world over? Yes, children spend their days greedily consuming everything they see and hear, only to throw it back up when you are least expecting it. Like my friend’s four-year-old niece, who sent shockwaves across her family last Christmas by yelling ‘let’s open the fucking presents!’

Childish enthusiasm knows no abstention, no tact, no diplomacy. It is boundless, heartfelt and unbearably honest. Just don’t ask for an opinion on your haircut.

Would the real baby Jesus please step forward?

Let's face it, you have to be a particularly abhorrent two year old not to be adorable. Especially if you spend most of the day immersed in a pretend (and much more satisfactory) world. This week I’ve been reminded that things are not always what they seem, and that sometimes this is a decidedly good thing.

I've been reprimanded for stepping on the Impster's imaginary dogs, not hearing her imaginary cats meowing, and accidentally washing up a chopping board with her imaginary olive pesto ('and now,' she hollers outraged, 'I have to start all over again!' Oops). To get her into the bath it is necessary to make believe picnics and train rides, and to get her out again, tents and camels; to get into pyjamas, ball dresses and glass slippers, and to bed a hastily improvised story on a subject of her choosing. I have been allocated the unflattering roles of Ugly Sister and Big Ears, but happily have also been permitted to marry a prince and eat strawberry tart, which seems like a fair enough trade.

It turns out that Christmas time has been specially designed for two year olds. On Christmas Eve I took the Impster to the children's service at the cathedral, dressed as an angel (any occasion which calls for the wearing of fairy wings in public goes down very well with the both of us). Just a few minutes before the service I hastily bastardised her white bridesmaid dress, fashioned a tinsel halo, and accidentally stabbed her with the needle a few times in a fervent attempt to attach the wings. Ta-da! - one angelic child.

But when we arrive, things get kind of complicated. 'Where's the Angel Gabriel?' she asks. To which I point out all the other angelically-attired children. 'No, the Angel Gabriel'. Oh, the real one. I see. 'Well, he's probably in the sky somewhere at the moment. He only pops down occasionally when someone really needs his help.' She ignores this unsatisfactory response and provides her own: 'He's upstairs with the baby Jesus I 'spect.' I nod sagely.

Ditto the wise men, ditto Mary, ditto the shepherds. Yes yes, she can see the children dressed up (durr Mummy!) but when are the real ones going to turn up? 'I can see the stable,' she says, looking up at the wooden screen in front of the choir. And as a baby starts crying mid-carol, she turns to me and says, 'That's the baby Jesus going waa waa waa I s'pose.'

The service, heaving with several hundred barely-continent toddlers does not last long, and there is a rush for the doors. But not for us. The Impster is not leaving until she has located 'the real baby Jesus'.

My explanation of how he lived a rather long time ago and isn't a baby any longer and how we are just remembering the story, suddenly seems fraudulent. You see, only the day before we have taken her on a steam train and she has met 'the real Father Christmas' who has given her presents and everything. Just like the story.

Now, if a two year old indulges in pretend it is a beautiful and charming thing. But somewhere along the line, pretending becomes dishonest and wrong, and we despise grown ups with any hint of 'pretence' about them. That’s why some very dedicated Christians actually refuse to let their children believe in Father Christmas. But without him, surely childhood is a bit, well, serious. If we stoke our imagination when it's young, let it run riot, fuel the furnace with all sorts of fantastical nonsense and whimsy and amusement, then just maybe we are expanding our capacity for belief; to believe in whatever we finally decide is worthwhile believing in.

So right now, as well as being ceaselessly entertained, I'm utterly evangelical about indulging in as much Christmas magic as you can conjure. I will never stop believing in Father Christmas. And if you've spent the week playing charades and feeling all bah humbug, do me a favour and just pretend.