Tis the season of wonder , the season of joy, the season of imagination. And with that in mind, I’m going to ask you to use a little bit of that imagination here.

OK, a lot of it.

First, if you’re someone to whom I should have sent a Christmas card, I’d like you to imagine I did. A nice one, with a picture of the entire happy Smith family on it.

Probably at the beach, since apparently all Christmas card photos have to be taken at the beach. I’m not sure why, exactly. Perhaps it’s when people feel they were at their best. Perhaps they want you to marvel at the fact they can take the entire family on vacation and still find time to send out a Christmas card. Perhaps it was the last time they were all together before someone got hauled off to juvenile detention. Whatever.

Now, I’d like you to imagine we’re all smiling, and no one has started screeching because, in the process of having everyone scrunch in as a show of family love and togetherness, a sunburn was touched.

I’d like you to imagine the youngest of the group has been corralled and convinced that if he keeps kicking sand on everyone, we’re going to feed him to the sharks the Lovely Mrs. Smith is convinced are hovering, with bibs on, just off the coastline.

I’d like you to imagine no one is complaining because we had to be on the beach for about four hours, waiting for the photographer to get there and take a picture in the 15 minutes where the light is just perfect. And Yours Truly hasn’t deduced that, despite the ridiculous sum we’ve spent on the photographer, the picture we’ll actually use was taken with a cell phone by some random drunk wearing camo Crocs who just happened to stagger by.

Now, if you happen to drive by my house, I’d like you to imagine it’s beautifully decorated (please don’t close your eyes and imagine, since you’ll be driving and I, you know, live around here.). Imagine the house is festooned with multicolored, blinking lights, there are giant candy canes lining the sidewalk and there is a huge inflated snow globe with Santa in it, looking just like he was grabbed by some monstrous space alien and stuck in a display jar (yep, ruined it for you, didn’t I?).

Don’t imagine the sight of me falling off a ladder, the roof, a tree, etc., while stringing up all those lights.

Or the sorts of things I tend to say, which given the season, probably aren’t that appropriate. But they do seem to ask for some very severe divine activity when I discover that old “when one goes out, they all go out” thing still seems to apply to some decorations.

You won’t have to imagine that because the Lovely Mrs. Smith already has, which is why she has a fit every time I climb on anything as high as a step-stool to change a light bulb. On the bright side, good to know I’m still worth more alive than dead.

But just barely.

And if I’m supposed to get you a present, you probably won’t have to imagine it, because the Lovely Mrs. Smith has made me. But you will need to imagine I spent hours at the mall, painstakingly searching for just the right thing for you and you alone. Not that Itook one look at the cars circling the parking lot like vultures and streaked back to the house where I ordered you something off a dot.com that was probably delivered by a drone.

Besides ordering presents isn’t all that bad. I ordered my mother seasons 2 and 3 of “Justified” for Christmas, because nothing says “I love you” like a TV show about a U.S. marshal shooting lots of people with neck tattoos.

What can I say? She’s an odd woman. OK, apple, tree; insert your own punch line here.

OK, now that you’ve imagined all that, here are some things you don’t have to imagine. Like, it’s been a real treat for me to share some of the goofiness of my life and the strange twists and turns of my imagination with you this year, and I thank you for allowing me to at least try to entertain you and generally lighten the mood a little.

And I hope you and yours had the merriest of Christmases and have the brightest and most hopeful of new years, full of love and laughter and family and peace.

Because I can’t imagine wanting anything more.

GARY SMITH IS A RECOVERING JOURNALIST LIVING IN ROGERS.

Opinion, Pages 5 on 12/26/2013