Mike Gould

The facade of our house, lit up by the necklace of lights which I risked life and limb to erect (ok - I got a rose thorn in the thumb), is like any other festively-decorated home merely a frontage for the realities of family life which have their ups and downs. But that, in a way, is the purpose of decoration - to draw us for a moment out of the everyday into a few seconds of wonder. I grant that my single set of cheap lights is not going to challenge that of a New York depar