The Gift Horse

“I have a gift for you!”

You’d think these words would inspire joy and frivolity. But over the years of receiving gifts, I’ve come to realize that I have a serious gift-related disability. Something happened to me when I hit puberty—I sort of developed a cloaking device that hid any trace of my affinity for anything.

It was Christmas, 1979, and I had just turned 11. My parents took me shopping in mid-December to a local discount store called Grandpa’s. Since I knew it was Christmas time, it was clear that I would not be getting any goodies at Grandpa’s, so this trip bored me to tears. My folks were loitering around for what seemed like hours to my 11 year old mind, but I tried to busy myself by browsing through the merchandise. I found myself in the record department. No, not the paperwork and historical data department, the RECORD department. That’s Old Lady talk for “the music department” or “the CD’s”.

Little did I know that my folks were carefully paying attention to what I was looking at, and surmised that the item I had looked at the longest was the item I was most interested in, therefore the perfect item to complete my Christmas gift list.  Had I known, I’d have spent more time browsing at The Clash’s “London Calling”, Michael Jackson’s “Off The Wall”, or even Supertramp’s “Breakfast in America”. My penchant for staring at train wrecks was my downfall that fateful Saturday afternoon. I remember this album was featured prominently on an endcap display, and when I first realized what it was, I thought, “Who in the WORLD would buy THIS?!” I noticed it was pricier than the other albums, though, so I was intrigued—what made it worth more than an Andy Gibb album? I turned it over to read more, and was deeply amused by the offerings of this unique album. “Grownups are stupid.” I muttered to myself as put it back and returned to my mother’s side. Fast forward to Christmas morning, and that very item that awaited my eager hands.

That’s right, that’s NIGHT MOVES--THE PROFESSIONAL APPROACH TO DISCO DANCE INSTRUCTION. Narrated by the famous Deney Terrio, host of Dance Fever, this gem comes with a photo-aided instruction booklet to help you learn all the big disco dance moves.  I was horrified.

I wish I could say this is the last time such a thing has happened, but almost every Christmas or birthday, you can almost certainly find a friend or family member of mine blindly stumbling around the mall in hopes of accidentally bumping into My Favorite Thing.

And it never fails to perplex me when I unwrap that paper and take it all in, what exactly I had done or said to lead them to believe that I would appreciate their choice. I don’t mean to be ungrateful. I’d like to suggest that everyone stick to the rule to only buy something that I have specifically said I like or would like to have, but a recent gift from my husband proves that memories can be tricky things. He swears I told him I loved the music of Christine McVie, and therefore felt strongly that a surprise gift of one of her albums would be appropriate. After all, I did not own any Christine McVie music. It really is the thought that counts sometimes.