At some point, buying gifts for people became genuinely difficult.

Not because I stopped caring, but because it seemed like most people I know either already have what they want or buy it for themselves the moment they want it. The window between wanting something and owning it has gotten very small. By the time a birthday or holiday arrives, the obvious gifts have already been taken care of.

So I started thinking about gift giving differently.

For adults, I have largely shifted toward experiences over objects. A meal together. A show. A day doing something that would not have happened otherwise. These are harder to buy in advance of wanting them, which means they actually arrive as gifts rather than duplicates of things already owned. They also tend to produce something an object rarely does: a specific memory attached to a specific person.

For children, I follow a loose version of something I came across years ago and have used ever since. Five categories: something they want, something they need, something to wear, something to read, and something to do.

The last one is the category I like best.

Something to do might be a concert, a museum visit, or something as simple as an afternoon of blueberry picking. An experience rather than a thing. Something that requires showing up rather than unwrapping.

Most children already have a great deal of stuff. More arrives constantly. What they often have less of is uninterrupted time with the people who love them, doing something specific and a little out of the ordinary. That tends to be remembered far longer than whatever came in a box.

The pressure around gift giving, to find the right thing, spend the right amount, and demonstrate care through the object itself, is largely cultural and largely optional. Most people, if asked, would rather spend time with someone they love than receive another thing that needs a home.

That is not a reason to stop giving gifts entirely. It is simply a reason to think a little differently about what a gift is actually for.

Sometimes it is an object.

More often, it is the chance to make a memory together.