Dear Christmas:

We would like to opt out. Please remove us from your subscriber list as we would no longer like to participate. You make my wife grumpy and guilty, and this makes me unhappy because I don’t like things that make my wife unhappy.
We (like most of the world, probably) suffer the lovely double whammy of spending money we don’t really have because we love getting cool things for the people in our lives and yet at the same time we end up feeling inadequate and guilty because there are so many wonderful people in our lives and therefore we do even a handful of them justice, much less, all or even most of them.

Yes, I know your pitch about how it’s the thought that counts and all that and I know that none of our friends would think less of us for not having a gift or having only a small token, but that doesn’t lessen the guilt or awkwardness especially if someone hands you something and you have nothing in return. It’s bad enough just knowing you can’t get something for everyone who means something to you but it’s even worse to be standing there holding something from someone with nothing to give back but an embarrassed “thanks!”
Yes, I know that this is really all our own problem and that we are creating this guilt and embarrassment ourselves within our own heads since, as previously mentioned, no one would think any less of us in these situations but somehow that doesn’t make it any better. The feelings will still be there.
We thank you, Christmas, for lifetime of fond memories and for the many more we hope to come, but it’s just too much. Please make suer no one ever gets us any gifts ever again so that we may live lives free of this particular variety of stress. Should anyone need us, we will be in bed, huddled under blankets sleeping until the new year.
Sincerely,
Heath Allyn, Esq.