Christmas has become a time of ghosts. Of my parents, of children who became adults, of dogs passed

After more than half a century of Christmases, memories still seem to somehow attach themselves, limpet-like, to unlikely gifts.

So many presents except books – I always keep books – end up, I hate to say, forming part of my life’s landfill. But there are a few unlikely stayers, simple gifts that keep on giving to the memory if not exactly to the prosaic practicalities of my life.