It's the Thought That Counts, But. . . .

I know by now I really shouldn't have such high expectations about gift-giving from my husband. We have been married for twenty years, and I can honestly say that he has never given me a gift, either for Christmas or my birthday, I that I actually wanted, asked for or was pleased with. I should just not have any expectations and then maybe one of these years, he will get something really great. It seems he always loses his mind when it comes to giving me a gift. We have been together for 21 years, we have four children and we talk about our likes and dislikes all the time. I just don't get why he gives me gifts that he wouldn't even give a stranger. This year, I should have expected something was amiss when he kept insisting my food chopper was broken. It isn't and I had no desire or need to replace it, but every time I was in the kitchen, he kept trying to get me to say it was broken. I thought it was strange, but didn't think he was trying to send some sort of subliminal message to me to make me say I needed another one. Sure enough, one of my presents from him was another chopper. Very weird. The other puzzler of a gift was two cardboard boxes. You know, the kind people who do that scrapbooking stuff use to organize their pictures? I'm really just guessing about that because I truthfully don't know what people do with those boxes. Sometimes those kind of boxes are very pretty and could be used for other things, but the boxes I got aren't pretty at all. Just sort of beige. That was a real head scratcher. My daughter was with him when he bought those things, and she asked him why he was buying that stuff and he didn't answer her. She told him she didn't think any of the items were all that useful to me, but deferred to his wishes; as we all do for fear of his angry outbursts.

I don't want to sound selfish. Really it would be better if he wouldn't try to give me anything at all because at least I wouldn't have to be embarrassed about trying to act like I like them. It is a terrible position to be put in. I dream about getting a nice pair of pajamas, or slippers, or a sweater, or socks--anything but a kitchen gadget! For twenty years I have tried to help him give me something that isn't a waste of money. I have told him outright what to get, I have written things down, I have asked the girls to guide him to what would be a good gift, all to no avail. He just wants to give these strange and awful things. Oh, I almost forgot, he did give me something kind of, well, good, I guess. I got a complete set of "Barney Miller" episodes. I really do need to lower my expectations!