The husband and I were watching Seinfeld one night. In that particular episode, Elaine celebrates her birthday. Seinfeld gives her $200 in cash (do men do that?). While she tries to impress upon him the beauty of the thought behind the gift, Kramer walks in and gifts her a table (worth $10). Needless to say she is impressed, with Kramer, the gift and his thought behind the gift. Set the scene for a much needed argument on the topic for the husband and me.
After noticing much rolling of eyes that I am wont to do in situations like these (’cause I so, so got the it’s-what-you-give-that-matters-not-its-price tag thing) the husband warily remarked that it was sensible to give her cash so (believe it or not) she could buy whatever she fancied. Was I going to explain to him why I disagreed with his interpretation of the basic tenet of gifting, and ruin the rest of the evening (for me). Of course I had to, ruined evening or not. So I did. At the end of a much heated argument (which might have involved a few gentle blows to the hands, legs and everything else that was in the line of vision) one had to mutely resign oneself to the fact that one was never going to get a bunch of fresh flowers and breakfast in bed for one’s birthday. Maybe an expensive necklace with a cheesy heart-shaped pendant (how I hate those!) twice in a row. But never the small things.
I must have done something right with my constant nagging ’cause this year the husband made up for all the lost years. Moral of the story- you can feel guilty all you want of the hen-pecking, but the moment you know that it yields results ah, lovely results, you know it’s the perfectly right thing to do. Only don’t make me write a book on it. ’cause once it’s out in the open like that, it’s irreversible. They will never read our minds the way we want them to.
Oh and you might also want to mention in passing, like I did, that this raises the bar for all the years and all the occasions to follow. I did add that I still had 1,843 things to cross off my list of small things (that can please me).
I am so easy to please.
Congrats!
[…] shopchic had some great ideas on this topic.You can read a snippet of the post here.Seinfeld gives her $200 in cash (do men do that?). While she tries to impress upon him the beauty of the thought behind the gift, Kramer walks in and gifts her a table (worth $10). Needless to say she is impressed, with Kramer, the gift … […]
Happy Birthday? (Belated?)
VBR- Ermm..thanks?
Broom- Yes, belated 🙂 Thanks!
Belated happy birthday 🙂
But tell..how did he make up??
SM
Hey! Happy birthday a little late. I can tell it was happy 🙂 when was it?
OOO, belated heppi burday!
SM, Shyam, Megha- Thank you, thank you!! It was roughly 2 weeks back 😉
The husband punctuated the day with gifts: 2 books (yay!), a pretty skirt & an even prettier kurti with earrings to match, ending in a lovely dinner at our favourite Italian restaurant topped off with delicious dessert!
There, I said it all. Now the husband won’t pull a long face and whine about me not giving him enough credit in the post 😀
and no song? hm…come on out with it!!! 🙂
Belated birthday wishes – have a great year ahead.
Usha- Hahahaha. Thank you. Honestly, no song (not even the customary happy bdy). Otherwise I woulda made a separate post outa that 😉
At times nagging works on irrelevant things. This year around, when he was not in country, he made sure I received the biggest bunch of carnations and the fattest chocolate cake first thing in the morning.
Awwww, why stop nagging when it has such wonderful results?