Ho! Ho! No.

I recently returned from London where I completed my tour of duty of some of the centers of the holiday universe: Regent Street, Liberty, Fortnum and Mason, Covent Garden … No one does Christmas like the Brits. Masterful holiday lights, bustling crowds, beautiful ornaments and decorations for the home, special things to eat, and, of course, everything you could imagine to buy as gifts.

thanks to Jeff Moore and Time Out

Then I returned home. Our valley is a kind of anti-matter to the London-style Christmas. The first few years we lived here I was stunned by the fact that there was virtually nothing to buy. Or to decorate the house with. Or to wrap presents with. Present options in our piazza include special housecoats to clean in. The farm stand has gift baskets with green peppers and celeriac. And there is this knitted lamp shade. The Santa (shown above) from the grocery-store-anchored mini mall sums it up.

There’s panforte, panettone, and things with truffles, but they can hardly compete with the goods on display in a big city. (There are exceptions to everything, of course. The family-run Busatti linens sold in the valley are revered around the world.) There’s none of that frenzied shopping bustle and long lines, except at the butcher.

I love this more relaxed version of Christmas. It was easy for me to think that my identity was defined by the presents I gave and how well-decorated my house was, but this world has offered up a different way to be during the holidays. Last year when I went to the sports store to buy ski wear there was only one set of choices, and you are lucky if they had the right size. There isn’t that treadmill of decisions about brands, performance, price, taste, and style.

Despite the lack of commercial Christmas cheer, I’ve never felt it more deeply. Everyone you meet greets you with an “Auguri!” and kiss. While running errands tonight I stopped by a church from the year 700, a stone’s throw from our house, while they were setting up the nativity scene. It gave me chills.

And this grabbed my attention as much as the lights over Piccadilly—what’s really going on in this life-sized manger scene near the piazza?