A Jarring Gift

My husband is a collector of collections.  This can be a good thing, as it is always easy to find the perfect gift for a collector.  Over the years we have amassed a frightening set of antique dental tools, old apothecary items, ancient medical texts, indentures, and artifacts from my husband’s ancestral home, Baker, Oregon.   Unfortunately, as is the case with some of our friends, my husband developed “stuff disease”—a condition where one requires more and more stuff.  A sure symptom that one is suffering from stuff disease is an excessive number of ebay transactions, followed by persistent PayPal withdrawals, and culminating in a steady stream of UPS deliveries.   The natural course of stuff disease, if left untreated, is that the afflicted (normally a male) develops an affinity for a grander and grander class of stuff, until the act of collecting reaches the terminal phase, thus bankrupting the family.  There are subclassifications of stuff disease:  speed disease is where men require fancier and fancier sports cars, foot disease applies to men who lust for larger and larger boats.

After a period of remission, brought about by a devious act of recombinant password-therapy, prolonged exposure to a colleague who suffers from a similar affliction brought my husband to Stage 2, moving him from a mild to a moderate form of stuff disease.  Thus, he began collecting vintage typewriters, fountain pens both new and old, nineteenth century French posters, and finally, timepieces (never to be confused with watches).   At this point, I decided to teach my husband a lesson.  For one full last year, I rejected all his less-than-subtle hints at pricey, bell-ringing, whistle-blowing gifts.  Instead, for each major occasion--birthday, anniversary, Valentine's Day, Christmas--I presented him with something I made by hand. 

This started as a bit of a joke, however, it became a personal challenge to surprise my husband with a creative and substantive “gift” for each occasion.  Although I am not certain, I suspect my husband enjoyed anticipating what would come next.   In truth, not everything was really fabricated with my own hands—I used a printing establishment, for example, to help me produce and bind small publications.  Thus began a year that included a how-to manual for making your wife happy, a book of self-penned love poems, a large canvas painting that was itself a puzzle, and “the jar”.

The jar was as simple as it sounds.  I bought a nice, amber-glass apothecary jar with a glass stopper.  From the craft store I bought various colors of card stock and a round craft punch.  I cut out one hundred little circles of card stock, carefully printing on each one something specific that I love about my husband.  These were presented to him in the jar on which I painted “100 Things I Love About You”. 

My children laughed at me as I sat at the kitchen table surrounded by dozens of one inch dots.  “How are you ever going to fill one hundred of those, mom?” they asked.  It turns out, it was not difficult.  I thought about the nearly thirty years we have been together, including not only the major events—such as the birth of our children, moving cross country, buying our homes—but also the mundane, everyday things—such as shopping for groceries, or servicing the cars, or getting through the daily grind.  During this process, I realized how much I have come to depend upon my husband.  Since he is 6’4” and I am 5’2”, he is very handy for reaching things in high places.  Having comparably large hands, he can get a much better grip on a stubborn jar than I can.  Both of these tasks he does for me willingly and generously, in many cases stopping his work, or going mobile on a conference call, in order to oblige me.  He is also naturally kind to strangers.  Even when approaching the fifth or sixth hour on the phone with a marginally-English-speaking Dell support person, he never raises his voice or takes out his frustration on the hapless guy from the call bank.  He always starts the phone call with ‘how are you?’ and ends with ‘take care’.  Over the years he has become a welcome companion, sharing meaningful observations while helping me shop for shoes and handbags.  During flu season, he brings home syringes and a vial of vaccine because he knows that he can save me a trip to the doctor’s office and administer it painlessly.

My husband is still working his way through the jar, pulling out one love fact per day.  I am enjoying how the memories these gems evoke are touching him. Every once in a while, he shows me the one he has just read and we reminisce together over its inspiration.  It was a revelation to him that each thing is really so very simple.  Isn't that really the point? 

There are many times in life when the “law of unintended consequences” smacks you hard across the face.  I set out, in a snarky sort of way, to teach my husband a lesson about excess and substance.  In the end, I became the student.  As I worked through a hundred reasons why I love my husband, it became apparent that these were a hundred little gifts I get from him every day. 

Tomorrow's blog:  Nanny's Banana Cake