Perspective: Soul food

HOLIDAY SOUL: If the holiday season seems every year to lose a little more meaning as we get caught up in its headlong rush to shop, decorate, eat, drink, do and cram more activities into a day than 24 hours can hold, then stop. Take some time to relax and put the meaning, and the reason, back into the season with Christmas in My Soul, edited by Joe Wheeler (Doubleday, $15.95).

The slim volume begins with an essay by Wheeler on the origin of St. Nicholas and his evolution into our familiar roly-poly, gift-bearing Santa Claus. The six stories that follow, by anonymous and named authors, recapture the true spirit of the holidays with their joyful or bittersweet, but always comforting and uplifting messages.

THE ART OF GIFT-GIVING: The year is 1933, the season, Christmas. But it's also the height of the Depression, and for the van Sloten family, the theme is more bah humbug than good cheer. It seems that for them, there will be no Christmas this year. Enter oldest son Tom, who decides to take matters into his own hands and give his family a Christmas, whatever it takes.

Inspired by true events, Secret Santa by Anne Osborn Poelman (Shadow Mountain, $15.95) is a heartwarming story of Tom's decision to be Santa for his family, a plan not without difficulties, from his proud, stubborn father to his overly curious sister, the drain on his meager college savings to the accusations that he was involved in the theft of his high-school teachers' coffee fund. For anyone faced with the question "Is it enough? Will the gifts be acceptable?" Secret Santa can offer both answers and inspiration.

SURVIVING THE HOLIDAYS: In his many years of practice as a clinical psychologist, Herbert Rappaport has noticed a consensus that there is something missing from the way we handle holidays, that "people . . . take solace when they hear that their holiday blues are shared by others." Recognizing that holidays are important, significant events in our lives, and that they bear an important relationship to not only the past but the present and the future, Holiday Blues: Rediscovering the Art of Celebration (Running Press, $17.95) presents an overview of the events we celebrate, profiles of the the different "holiday blues personalities" -- grinch, loner, merrymaker or lost soul -- and techniques and tips for surviving the holidays that mark the passage of our lives. What better time to transform the blues into joy than now, during what is assuredly the longest and most stressful holiday season of the year.

- Nancy Paradis is the Times Action columnist.

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