Especially for you

I just received a late Christmas present. Or rather, I just discovered it. Under my sofa, where it was apparently kicked at some point. The thing is, I didn't know it was a Christmas present, when I found it in my Post Office box on Christmas Eve. It was from Vista Print. I had ordered some business cards from them a few months ago, but knew I hadn't ordered anything from them recently. And yet, on the three large envelopes inside the padded mailer was imprinted 'Thanks for your order!' I had the fleeting thought: Oh, it's going to be one of those unordered-merchandise-return-to-sender things. (Although yes, I know you can't do that once you've opened a package.) So anyway I tossed the package aside to be dealt with later; at the time, I was right in the middle of my brother's visit.

Recently my friend Fae asked me via email if I'd received a Mystery Package at Christmas. Having completely forgotten about the parcel from Vista Print (out of sight out of mind with me, and it had now been under my couch for who knows how long), I responded in the negative. Then this evening when I was searching everywhere for the spiral notebook in which I write my List of Things To Do, and without which I am lost, I looked under the sofa, and found the Mystery Package. When I opened the interior envelopes I saw sheets and sheets of beautiful return address stickers...with lighthouses on them. And a light bulb went on in my head. I had mentioned in my Note of December 18, 2010 that I couldn't shorten the amount of time doing Christmas cards takes by using return address stickers, because I considered those a little luxury I really couldn't afford. And most of my friends know by now that I love lighthouses. So...my lightening brain was busy putting two and two together...Fae had ordered luxury return address stickers for me, but since they came directly from the printer's, I hadn't known that.

But now I did, and could properly thank my good friend for her thoughtful gift.

This is the kind of gift I like to both receive, and give. A sudden realization that something would be perfect for someone, and promptly getting it for him or her. Not because it's Christmas, or their birthday, but because you know they need it, or would love it. My friend Ernest once sent me an audio book of The Iliad, read by Derek Jacoby, because he knew I was a huge fan of the actor's.
My sister's trip to the San Francisco area at Thanksgiving was a gift from me to her, because I knew it was some-thing she'd enjoy, and indeed needed, but could not afford.

A monetary gift need not be of the I-don't-know-what-else-to-get-you-so-here's-some-money variety. My English friends Ann and John once sent me $500, because both Micheal and I were at the time unemployed, and I had just incurred a large hospital bill as the result of what was apparently a mild heart attack. I wanted to pay them back, but they insisted it was a gift. A friend who would probably prefer to remain nameless sent me a gift in early fall that made it possible for me to make the trip to Texas I'd been wanting to make for months.

I also love gifts that are the result of personal effort/ talent. The above-mentioned Fae has delighted me with bracelets she made herself (she's a beader), and a very long knitted scarf she'd made herself (she's also a knitter). My friend Mary frequently includes Haiku poems she's written with birthday/Christmas cards, and one of the loveliest gifts I ever received was a whole book of them that she had produced. My friend Robert offered me my choice of a number of his art works, when I saw him in Ft. Worth this fall; a long time ago he did a watercolor of an owl for me, because he knew I liked owls.

It's people at their best: giving, to give pleasure.