Hillbilly Elegy

consider just how lucky I am.
Still, shopping for low-income kids
reminds me of my childhood and of the
ways that Christmas gifts can serve as
domestic land mines. Every year the
parents in my neighborhood would begin
an annual ritual very different from the
one I’ve become accustomed to in my
new material comfort: worrying about
how to give their kids a “nice
Christmas,” with niceness always
defined by the bounty underneath the
Christmas tree. If your friends came over
the week before Christmas and saw a
barren floor beneath the tree, you would
offer a justification. “Mom just hasn’t
gone shopping yet” or “Dad’s waiting