I was on the phone with a friend, while we both looked at the online list of another friend’s wedding registry.
“There are so many things here,” I complained to my friend. “And most of them are just too much.”
“I know. Like number 3 — a set of crystal glassware for eight. Who even uses crystal, any more?”
“Or number 21 — a covered soup tureen? I thought those were obsolete!”
At any moment, you can open a letter or an email and find yourself invited to an event where gift-giving is expected. It can be frightening. There are so many ways to go wrong!
For example: in some families, money is taboo — how could you be so tacky as to give money? But in other families (mine for example), it was almost the exact opposite — money is the only gift that’s sure to please.
I still love the friends who gave me a ceramic pitcher the exact shape and size of a 2-foot-high penguin, and painted like one too — but I admit, I have wondered just a bit about their judgment.
“Maybe they were just re-gifting what someone had already given them, Judy.”
“Maybe; but that still leaves unaccounted for, somewhere in America, the kind of people who would give the gift of a ceramic penguin!”
Reading somebody’s registry list is a little like reading their mind… the wackier parts. Some choices make perfect sense, but others…. Let’s just say that if you take two people who are still high on the adrenaline rush of declaring big news to their family; give them a barcode-scanning “gun” to compile their wishes, and let them loose in a store — well, maybe that explains a few things:
“Barbecue Tongs.”
“4 pairs of flame-proof mitts.”
“Fire extinguisher.”
“First-aid kit.”
I once bought myself a set of kitchen tools at one of those stores and when I opened up the box, I found a card inside:
“We are so impressed that you two lovebirds want to share all the cooking! You’re the best!”
Obviously, the two lovebirds had returned the gift without ever peeking inside. (Alas for me, there was no cash included.)
Another problem I’ve had with giving things from a registry is that no one seems to be in charge when they go astray.
Take the time I bought a registry-listed set of placemats for a cousin, as a wedding shower gift. I never heard from her, and never got a thank you note, either — so I simply assumed her arm was broken, or that she’d never heard of such things as thank-you notes. I decided to forgive her for her bad manners and sent another gift for the wedding.
A thank you note for the wedding gift arrived while they were still on their honeymoon!
When I next saw this cousin, I had to ask: “What gives? How come you’re so quick with this thank you note but nothing for the placemats?”
“What placemats?” she answered. They had never arrived. And until I asked about them, she’d been thinking I was the one with no manners!
This is why handing someone a card with a check is infinitely preferable. Plus you never have to worry about somebody else’s inexplicable taste.
“A china service for 8, with cups and saucers? I don’t even like that pattern!”
“That’s not the point, Judy. This isn’t about you.”
“But I ask you — a dining table and chairs? Who lists that, as a wedding gift?”
“If that’s what Sam and Sharon need us to do for them, then that’s what they need!”
As it turns out, this is the second marriage for both Sam and Sharon, and they are trying to combine two households and downsize, all at the same time. So what they had set up was actually a Reverse Registry: Whatever you signed up for, that’s what you were agreeing to take home with you, and off their hands!
“Well, I guess I can help with one chair and some coffee mugs. I go through those pretty fast. I’ll take the soup tureen, too — I think I gave her that, in the first place!”
Just one more reason why folks should stick to giving money. It’s always in style, it always fits, and it’s easily returned!
