I should start tracking this to see if it’s the same every year; I can say that THIS year the change from “This is fun; I’ve got this!” to feeling overwhelmed/stressed happened right around December 11th. I am hugely grateful to Past Swistle who got all the cards done early, as well as the all the shopping for the two kids from the local Christmas program, as well as quite a bit of other shopping.

I am having my usual and apparently ENDLESS/LIFETIME struggle with thinking I have to do The Most Important Thing FIRST, and then getting stuck because I can’t do that most important thing yet. Fortunately I am also having my usual and apparently ENDLESS/LIFETIME rediscovering of “If I can’t do The Most Important Thing, it is helpful to do LITERALLY ANYTHING ELSE.” This means that a week later, when there is a new Most Important Thing, sometimes I have ALREADY DONE IT when it was not yet a priority. It can feel a little silly to be shopping for Target gift cards for the mail carriers when it is still a month until I need those and it is MUCH MORE IMPORTANT to get Rob’s gifts purchased and into the mail—but it doesn’t feel silly when it’s a week until Christmas and shipping would take 10 days and I wouldn’t want to go into a store, and instead I can just reach into my gift cupboard where the cards have been nestled up and waiting for a couple of weeks.

It is making me clench my teeth to see so many shipping estimates already after Christmas, especially a day or two ago when there were still TWO WHOLE WEEKS before Christmas. You know I have a persistent goal of trying to cut back on Amazon shopping (I am not in any way trying to eliminate it entirely), but there are times when Amazon can get something to me well before Christmas, and the company I’d rather order from is saying it will be January 3-10th, and in those cases I am not feeling even the slightest inclination to self-scold. Oh, I suppose you could get stroppy about it and say “Well, you should have gotten yourself organized to order it back before Thanksgiving, then!!,” but I do hope none of us would be like that, either to ourselves or to others. Not at this festive season.

And things ARE still festive! I don’t mean to imply I am now a roiling mass of stress and nothing is fun! No! I am enjoying the Christmas lights, and reading my Christmas books. We are watching a Christmas show or part of a Christmas movie each evening. I am using my Christmas mugs, which is one of my favorite things; and Henry has been on a pre-bedtime tea kick, which I have joined, so that means choosing an extra Christmas mug each day. Over the weekend I tried a festive cranberry cheesecake recipe, which I was going to save until closer to Christmas—except I remembered we always have PLENTY of sweet festive foods close to Christmas. So I made it at the perfect moment, which was just in time to start stress-eating it.

I am enjoying the feeling of ticking things off the list. At this point, the rising stress is what helps me finally click the order button on things I’ve been waffling about. There is no more time to browse pages of earring possibilities for your niece, it is time to click and purchase! You need one more gift for Paul’s sister before you can ship her box, so you’d better pick something now! A little surge of stress, followed by the satisfaction of having successfully Done the Thing: the earrings ordered, the gift chosen and bought, the relief of no longer waffling.

It is pleasing to track the package I mailed to my parents and see that it will be there today; once it’s there, that part of Christmas clicks into place. This weekend we will fetch the twins, and then all of us who are coming home will be home, and THAT part of Christmas will click into place. I will select a gift for my workplace Secret Santa exchange, and I will put it in a pretty gift bag and sneak it into work and put it somewhere they’ll find it, and there will be another click. Click, click, click, it is getting done!

FOR A VARIETY OF REASONS (management shake-up, literal building/structural chaos, an unusual number of employees leaving and being replaced but not soon enough so there has been scrambling, and then of course there are New People), my co-workers and I have recently been under noticeable levels of occupational stress. “This is fine,” we say to each other numerous times per day. “It’s fine. We’re fine.”

Also: in December, it is common for some of us, like maybe a third to us (which seems like the perfect percentage to make it easy for each person to do it or not as they prefer), to give out a small giftie to each of our co-workers. Last year, I handed out treat baggies containing a packet of cocoa (cinnamon, which was the best, but that’s discontinued so I’ve linked to pumpkin spice which is also good), a tea bag, a lil snack (these look nutritious/breakfasty, but they taste like big delicious cinnamon/oaty creme-filled cookies), and several little candies.

(image from Target.com)

THIS year, I would like to do something with a little bit of a calming / stress-relief theme. Imagine the same baggies, but filled with:

• a face-mask: they were on a 50%-off-plus-$10-gift-card-if-you-spend-$30 deal, I’m sorry, I should have given you a heads up but it all happened so fast, but anyway I acquired enough to give one to each co-worker

• a soothing tea bag, maybe a second soothing tea bag

(image from Target.com)

• a piece of chocolate, maybe some soothing cookies

And probably that’s enough. But does anything else spring to mind? I want to be careful to avoid the Wedding Favor Trap, where one starts to buy things just to buy things, and ends up spending quite a bit of money on multiples of things no one actually wants, so maybe I should just stop right there: if I were the recipient, I would enjoy those things but not, say, a stress ball purchased just to hammer home the concept of stress relief. And something like calming lavender hand lotion is nice, but too expensive when multiplied by more than a dozen coworkers. I would LOVE to do some tiny liquor bottles, but I am aware of several coworkers who do not drink.

Like, just for starters, this poster Henry (age 16) wanted:

(image from Amazon.com)

What……what am I looking at?

He also wanted Tales of the Dying Earth, by Jack Vance.

(image from Amazon.com)

I generally like to get them any book they ask for, but mid-century male-written science fiction makes me nervous. It’s so often simply PACKED with the written equivalent of busty warrior women wearing skimpy leather battle bikinis, among other problematic themes. I was interested to see that Jack Vance has also written as Ellery Queen; it’s been a long, long time, but I remember reading through our library’s collection of Ellery Queen. Maybe in high school?

Elizabeth has this bike bell (in currently-unavailable blue), and said she asked Rob if he has a bike bell, and he says he does not, and she thinks we should get him this one, so I got it for him in yellow.

(image from Amazon.com)

Elizabeth wanted a grow light for a plant she has in her dorm room. It was hard to choose one, so I hope this one is good.

(image from Amazon.com)

I looked for one that would come on and off automatically.

I have a child who loves (1) Taco Bell and (2) Untitled Goose Game, so this Take Bell t-shirt is going under the tree.

(image from Amazon.com)

For my nephew who likes Strange Planet, the 2024 day-to-day calendar.

(image from Amazon.com)

Hoodies hoodies hoodies for everyone. (WAIT FOR SALES. THERE ARE ALWAYS SALES.)

(image from gap.com)

Elizabeth got a set of these blank journals awhile back, and asked for another set for Christmas:

(image from Amazon.com)

She also asked for American Sign Language flash cards; she and her friends are trying to learn it.

(image from Amazon.com)

And she’s asked for Posca markers.

(image from Amazon.com)

William asked for Sculpey; we have a toolbox full of it, but he wanted his own.

(image from Amazon.com)

William also wants a Peter’s Projection Map, but we have enough things for him for Christmas so this will probably be birthday.

(image from Amazon.com)

I thought about getting William this rental-friendly home-repair book, now that he’s graduated college—but since he doesn’t have an apartment lined up yet, I didn’t want the gift to seem Pointed. Perhaps this can be for birthday, too. Or perhaps none of our children will ever be able to afford rent, at the rate things are going.

(image from Amazon.com)

I would be very interested to hear what you are getting for the assorted teenagers in your life. I am hoping to poach your ideas.

You may remember me saying not long ago that I was not planning to do a Calendar Post this year. I’d been doing them for over a decade, so it felt weird to stop, but I wanted to stop so I thought I would stop. I particularly liked Allison‘s comment: “I will miss the calendar post, but I am all for people quitting things that don’t serve them anymore, and not doing things just because they have always been done.”

YES. I too am all for that!! We can stop doing Christmas cards, if we don’t want to do them anymore, or we can do them just on the years we feel like it! We can taper off on that tradition of buying each kid a new ornament every year, if it starts not making sense anymore! We can make gingerbread houses every year if we want to, or we can make them just some years, or we can stop making them, or we can tell the other people in the household that if THEY want to make them so badly THEY can be the ones to run that gigantic messy project and clean up after it! We can send Paul’s sister a box of See’s chocolates each year for four years and then stop doing it and send a different treat instead! We can do a certain thing every year or every month or every week, and then we can just…STOP. So I felt relief about the calendar post. I felt good about the decision. I added “I am all for people quitting things that don’t serve them” to my personal philosophy.

Well, but then I started putting calendar options in my cart, and I found I was feeling the urge to post the options, to show you and/or to get your opinion and/or so that maybe we’d be calendar twins next year. Which is how the calendar posts started originally! At this point I only need one for my kitchen, but back then I had multiple calendars to buy: I used to buy one for my kitchen, and one for by my desk, plus one for each kid bedroom—so there were a LOT of calendars to consider. And then I got really into it and started looking for more options, calendars I wasn’t myself considering but thought other people might like to consider, maybe some amusing or whimsical options.

Which doesn’t mean it has to be done that way forever! I can go back and do a reduced version of the original way—which would also combine well with what commenter Lauren suggested, which is that maybe we could do a sort of DIY calendar post where people could still talk in the comments about what they’re choosing this year. Well, that sounds just perfect. Those of us who still buy wall calendars are a SHRINKING SUBPOPULATION, and I too would still like to hear about what the rest of you are getting. So I will just show the calendars I am considering this year, without making a big PRODUCTION out of it, and everyone else who’s interested can talk about the calendars they’re considering/buying this year.

(image from Amazon.com)

Annie Soudain calendar. I appreciate art that lines up with the seasons, and I like these pictures. So I can’t explain why every time I look at the pictures I get a little negative adrenaline. It shouldn’t be happening! But it is. And this is going to be an election year, and last election year I got stress hives for months, so let’s reduce adrenaline where we can, even if it is inexplicable adrenaline that makes no sense.

(image from Amazon.com)

Joyful Landscapes calendar. This seems more soothing. Perhaps it is a little trite? But I like the colors, and there’s lots to look at in each picture, and I am not looking for, like, ART THAT SHOCKS YOU AND MAKES YOU THINK this year. There is nothing wrong with pleasant and mild.

(image from Amazon.com)

Feline: Terry Runyan’s Cats calendar. I have had this calendar twice before, and have been very happy with it both times. I don’t know if I would repeat a calendar a third time, but it’s a known hit and that’s hard to refuse completely, and also there are a couple particularly charming pages this year.

(image from Amazon.com)

Esté Macleod calendar. This is another one I’ve successfully bought twice, so it’s unlikely I would choose it again so soon and yet I don’t want to automatically dismiss it. But the art is giving me an inexplicable adrenalized feeling like the Annie Soudain (I think for a non-election year I would experience it as “stimulating,” but anxiety is warping it), and those two things combined are enough for me to remove it from the cart for this upcoming year—but I wanted to mention it in case you wanted to consider it, because I did enjoy it the other two years.

(image from Amazon.com)

There are at least three (one! two! three!) William Morris wall calendars, and my inability to prefer one over the others may be what prevents me from buying any of them. But one of my most surprisingly satisfying calendars EVER was a wallpaper calendar, so I don’t want to be too quick to get discouraged.

(image from Amazon.com)

Praise for the Pollinators calendar. I like the pictures and I like the VARIETY of the pictures.

(image from Amazon.com)

Royal Academy of Arts calendar. This calendar gets even more points for variety: I like that every page is a different artist.

(image from Amazon.com)

Orders of the Animals calendar. Lots of interesting things to look at, and I like the overall style of the art, and I feel as if I’d learn something.

Okay, that’s it! What I will do now is keep looking at them in my cart (or I keep re-reading this post), and what usually happens next is I start feeling “I just don’t WANT that one, even though I SHOULD and sort of DO!” about some of them, and eventually I think “I just WANT that one, and I don’t know why!” about ONE, and then I buy it.

If you are one of the wall-calendar group: What are you buying this year, and/or what is your calendar-choosing strategy?

Do you know what I have noticed, just the past few years? They are playing Dan Fogelberg’s Same Old Lang Syne amidst the Christmas songs. I do not at all object: it takes place on Christmas Eve! And that is a song from my childhood, albeit one that baffled me as a child and baffles me in different ways as an adult (DID THEIR GROCERIES NOT MELT AS THEY SAT IN THE CAR FOR HOURS??? DIDN’T THEIR RESPECTIVE PARTNERS WONDER WHERE THEY WERE??? THEY SHARED A SIX-PACK AND THEN DROVE???).

But what I mean is that I don’t remember hearing it as a Christmas song before a few years ago. Now, I could be misremembering. This could be an early-onset neurological thing. But…I listen to Christmas songs a LOT, starting as soon as Thanksgiving is over. And it is a VERY childhood-associated song for me. So if they HAD played it on Christmas radio before, I feel like I WOULD HAVE NOTICED, because the FIRST time they played it on Christmas radio (…that I remember…) I was jaw-dropped RIVETED. I remember I was taking a shower, and as it started playing I just stood there listening with that weird feeling of “This is so incredibly familiar but also I don’t know what it is.” Once I recognized it, it was interesting listening to the song’s story as an adult rather than as a child.

Also: that song is OVER FIVE MINUTES LONG.

I am in that middle range of Christmas shopping. I had a bunch of things in various online carts, and some of those things went on sale over the several weeks of Black/Cyber/Friday/Monday and I bought them, and some of those things I decided not to buy. I have more things that I would like to buy, and it’s hard to know if I should wait for a sale. And I have a lot of gaps to fill: in some cases I have several ideas and am waffling among them; in some cases I have tons of ideas that all seem Good Enough but I’m worried I’ll choose some and then find Something Better; and in some cases I don’t have any good ideas and am not sure when to start thinking about it for real, rather than waiting for ideas to come to me on their own. So after a flurry of packages, there is a lull.

I thought of a good idea for Rob, but the execution of it would be challenging. There is this particular local store-brand pizza sauce that he likes far more than any other sauce. [Edited to clarify: local TO ME, I mean; Rob can’t buy it where he is now.] There is no way, as far as I can tell, to buy it online and have it shipped to him. But I could go to considerable effort and expense to do it myself. The trouble is: do we think it will work to ship glass jars of pizza sauce, or do we think this shipment is more likely to break, leaking terribly staining sauce over many people’s holiday packages?

I thought I could start by asking a grocery store employee if the sauce comes to them in a nice sturdy case. Like, I’m imagining it coming to them in a box with cardboard dividers between each jar. Perhaps they would sell me an entire case with the packaging.

Still, even if it DOES have that packaging, that’s only designed to protect it from a truck ride, where everyone involved in moving it around is being relatively careful. It is NOT made for being dropped or thrown. It would be so disappointing to go to the trouble/expense and then have it arrive worthless.

I HAVE successfully shipped him a single jar of the sauce: I was sending some sort of box to him already, and the flat rate box was the better price but was only half-full, so I was trying to think of what to put in there. I wrapped the jar in that big-bubble bubble wrap and put it in a gallon ziploc just in case, and it DID get there safely. So even if I don’t brave a case of it, I’ll bet I could send a jar or two in the Christmas box I’ll already be sending. And one does want to be careful not to deluge one’s adult children with things they USED to like but maybe have since found acceptable replacements for and no longer feel strongly about. A jar or two can be fun and appreciated no matter the situation; a case might be “ohhhhhhh noooooooooo.”

I impulse(/gin)-ordered Rob a tiny real tree yesterday evening:

(image from Amazon.com)

You know, I have TRIED to scale back on Amazon, for philosophical reasons, and I have succeeded to some extent. But when I look up my options for sending someone a tiny live tree, and I get results that include a $120-plus-shipping option, a $75-plus-delivery option, a $150-plus-shipping option, and a $24-with-free-shipping option, I am going to use Amazon, because the other three options mean I am not going to impulse-order my far-away child a small live Christmas tree, and I DO want to order him a small live Christmas tree.

One thing I am pretty sure I have discussed with Rob, but I need to make a point of discussing it again, is the concept of re-gifting. You may remember Rob is the one who doesn’t want anything, though he does understand me when I explain that I cannot give him literally nothing for Christmas. But I think it really, really helps, when receiving gifts one doesn’t want, to remember that one person’s oppressive unwanted gift is another person’s delightful holiday surprise. If Rob doesn’t want the little tree, and feels oppressed by it, then he could give it to his landlord, or he could leave it anonymously outside a neighbor’s door with a little note, or he could drop it off at his library, or he could give it to his bike-repair shop; he could give it to the friend he had a picnic with, which is all he told us and he wouldn’t tell us anything else about either the friend or the picnic; he could drop it off at a local charity or business. Giving away the gift could end up being the fun part of the gift for him, and I want to make sure he knows about that.

Along similar lines, one of my only gift suggestions he responded positively to was the idea of a stack of $5 bills for him to hand out when he sees someone asking. I might expand that into a gift of $5 bills, soft breakfast bars, hand/toe warmers, and ziploc baggies, so that he can make little bags to hand out. (Or he can choose to hand out just the bills, and donate/use the other things.)

We are also giving him money for him to donate to his favorite charity. I wanted to make the donation myself, in his name, but then he doesn’t get the tax credit, and also it means we’re the ones who get all the emails begging for more money, so I send him the money and he makes the donation.

Last year we got him symphony tickets (he likes classical music), which I’d hoped would be so successful we could just do it again year after year, a ticket to one concert for Christmas and a ticket to another concert for his birthday, done and done!—but no. He liked trying it, but doesn’t have any particular interest in going again.

He has turned down experience gifts. He has turned down gift cards to local restaurants, furniture stores, clothing stores, online stores, the bike/repair store, various services. He has turned down computer equipment and exercise/sports equipment. He has turned down wall art (except for a large city-map poster, which we gave him last year), subscription boxes of all kinds, upgrades to things he has (such as a better frying pan or a better pillow), a compact printer, a personal blender, a savings bond, a suitcase (he has the GIANT ones he moved with, but I thought he might want a smaller more practical size for normal trips—and it could fit inside one of the big suitcases), the new Zelda game, replacements of favorite-but-now-ratty t-shirts. If you are thinking you have an idea, you might as well say it because WHO KNOWS?—but the most likely thing is that he already turned it down and I just didn’t want to make this paragraph any longer.

I am getting him a pair of sturdy but comfortable casual work pants: apparently he was a bit stuck when his company wanted him to appear in person for a (casual) work conference. Paul got him a bicycle basket (Rob doesn’t have a car, and he rides his bike everywhere) that snaps easily on and off the front of the bike to turn into a handled shopping basket. I am sending the usual practical stocking stuffers: new underwear, new socks, new toothbrush, new razors; but with much much less candy than I’m giving his siblings, because he has mentioned not wanting much candy. I’ll send him the usual filled plastic candy cane; the overpriced cylinder of mini M&Ms that accidentally turned out to be a CRUCIALLY IMPORTANT part of stockings for the kids; a few chocolate coins; maybe some small special/expensive chocolate thing. I’m sending a wee can of cranberry sauce I was charmed by at the grocery store. I’m sending one of those teensy metal-wire strings of teensy LED lights for his live tree, maybe a few teensy ornaments too but Paul said “He won’t want to have to store those.” And I’m sending him new flannel pajama pants, because he said that’s mostly what he wears day in and day out now (he works remotely). None of this sounds good to me. I am trying not to worry.

• Put up and decorate the Christmas tree, maybe even if you’re a die-hard “NOT UNTIL DECEMBER!!” person—because the college kid(s) won’t be back until mid-December, and that might be kind of late by even a die-hard’s standards.

• Have them make a list of the holiday movies/shows they want you to wait to watch until they’re home for Christmas break, so that you can watch the other ones on the nights between now and then. Before they go back, have them pick one they want to watch to kick off the season. Get weepy about it.

• Annual flu/Covid shots. Or maybe your kids will manage to take advantage of the much more convenient campus clinics! My kids so far have not managed that, despite subtle coaching. And, one time, in one case, I tried to manage it for them, and all the appointments were full 15 minutes after the email went out, so perhaps it is not all that convenient after all.

• Woo them with a sentimental meal, in addition to all the scheduled Thanksgiving-food wooing.

• Maybe also a sentimental cookie/bar/cake/pie. Or maybe there is already too much leftover dessert in the house.

• Take a family photo for the Christmas card, if you send out cards.

• Do they need deodorant? shampoo? conditioner? granola bars? Kraft Easy Mac? It is cheaper to buy it here than on campus! THOSE SHYSTERS

• Winter coats? winter boots? gloves? hat? scarf? WHAT HAVE THEY FORGOTTEN? MUST PROTECT BABY FROM FROSTBITE!!

• Send them back with advent/countdown calendars, if applicable! We don’t usually buy the chocolate countdown calendars for the household, but I DO buy them for college kids.

• Send them back with Christmas lights for their dorm rooms, if applicable! Maybe some snowflake lights, if you don’t do Christmas lights!

As soon as the Thanksgiving meal is over, I crack out the pine-scented hand soap. CHRISTMAS SEASON, BITCHES. Well, that is just me trying to sound cool.

Here is the little thing I keep saying to myself as I am doing my Christmas shopping and seeing things I want for myself: “I don’t need that.” Alternative phrases, also in use: “I have enough of that”/”I don’t want to have to find a place for that.”

If, however, I find I DO need that, DON’T have enough of that, or DON’T MIND AT ALL finding a place for that, then I go ahead and buy it. I know I have mentioned on other occasions that after a couple of decades of I don’t know what to call it, I now fill my own stocking. There is a big-picture way in which this sucks, but I have found several silver linings to it, one of which is that when I see things throughout the year that might be difficult to justify buying (face lotion/wash that costs more than I would usually spend but it’s on a good sale; Hello Kitty lip balms; stickers I absolutely do not need), I can buy them, For My Stocking. I have an opaque bag in the gift cupboard where I put those things, so that many of them end up being actual surprises. Thank you, Earlier-in-the-Year Swistle! How sweet of you to think of me! I feel so loved!

This would be an excellent moment for you to suggest some little indulgences any of us might wish to purchase for our own stockings. I will be taking INTENSE NOTES.

Abrupt segue. I am not planning to do the annual calendar post this year. I hesitate even to mention this, because sometimes when I see someone bracing other people for something they’re not going to do, as if they think it is something other people need to brace for, my reaction is not positive. Sometimes I think uncharitable thoughts. But also I know how I feel about certain regular, predictable events. So anyway I am saying it, super casually, just in case you would like to know ahead of time. I am not sure which wall calendar I will buy for the kitchen this year (though, based on current mood, probably a comforting repeat from a previous year), but I have already bought the Pusheen day-to-day calendar for my desk.

Four kids are here for Thanksgiving, and it is wonderful. If right now you are in the pits of little-kid busyness and exhaustion, let me just say that older kids can be a delight I didn’t know to anticipate.

I have a happy/relieved update on the back molar dental woe situation.

Back when I first told you of the woe, several of you mentioned having had a back molar pulled and no implant put in, with no ill effects despite threats of ill effects. Another local friend mentioned the same thing: could not afford implant so threats were scary but moot; had back molar pulled, didn’t get implant; nothing happened.

I went to see my beloved and trusted oral surgeon prepared with a compromise: what if she pulled the tooth and did the first step of the implant, the one that needs to be done right after the tooth is pulled, which is to put in the bone graft; and then we just didn’t do anything else? Then, if my teeth started shifting or if I had trouble chewing or WHATEVER, the bone graft would already be in place and we could proceed with the implant; but if there were no ill effects, I would only be out the cost of the bone graft.

She counter-offered: she said we should just pull the tooth and not waste money on the implant OR on the bone graft. She said:

• after the initial adjustment period, I was not going to notice the loss of chewing surface

• teeth shift forward, not back, so my teeth were not going to shift

• the bone graft would cost $750 and my body would dissolve/absorb it after a couple of years if we didn’t use it for an implant, and she didn’t think we WOULD end up using it for an implant, so it would be a waste of money and bone

• she hardly ever does an implant replacement for the back molar, because there’s not much bone back there and not much room back there and there’s a pretty strong chance of the implant failing anyway

So she’s going to pull the tooth, it’s going to cost approximately $250 (something like $40 more if I want nitrous oxide) (I am going to want a little nitrous oxide, as a treat), and there is no huge looming implant expense to deal with.

This is one of the many reasons I love this doctor: she is philosophically opposed to unnecessary/expensive procedures, even if it would be to her own personal benefit to perform them. (I do not think my dentist is similarly philosophically opposed.) She did not argue against putting in an implant when one of my upper two front teeth perished: she felt that was a good value, and so did I. But an upper back molar? Pull it and be done with it.

This is a bit of a niche post. But I have started playing Pokémon Go again after a lengthy break, and I am doing a lot more things with it than I used to do, and I was getting so frustrated trying to figure out how to earn the “Battle together” heart with my buddy. I kept searching online and being incredulous that I couldn’t find an answer, only other people asking the same question. Sometimes people would respond, “Oh, just make sure you give your buddy a treat so they’re walking with you, and then go fight in a battle!”—and that didn’t work at all. Now that I have figured it out, I am posting it in the hopes that other frustrated people will be able to find it.

Here’s what the buddy screen looks like, where it shows you all the hearts you can earn each day:

And HERE IS WHAT YOU DO TO EARN THAT BATTLE TOGETHER HEART. When you are in THIS OTHER SCREEN, the one where you have entered a battle in a gym but are waiting for the battle to begin, don’t hit READY like Paul did, because you are going to need the time:

Click on ANY OF THE SIX Pokémon it automatically sets up for you. (If I’d been thinking clearly, I would have selected the SIXTH slot, since my buddy is more of a floofer than a fighter. But I was not thinking clearly, I was EXHILARATED BY A SUDDEN INSIGHT. So you can see him in that first square, because I took this screen shot in the glow of triumph when the idea worked.)

Clicking on one of the six selected Pokémon will take you to all your Pokémon. Scroll through your Pokemon until you find YOUR BUDDY. Then CLICK ON your buddy. Your buddy will be put in as one of your six fighters. AND IT WILL EARN A HEART!

It was so relatively obvious once I figured it out, but I was honestly stumped for like a YEAR.