It’s that time of year when Christmas looms. It should be a happy day to remember, and yet there’s always the problem of gift giving. One example: the tale of a local couple: Mary (real names changed) tried each year to please hubby John, fearing it would again be of no use.

She tried for Father’s Day with an extravagant tie, something that pleased him until the kids  howled at the sight of it. He never wore it again. She tried tools, which he would destroy as soon as he attempted to use them – and cut fingers in the bargain.  She tried a little robot  (supposed to deliver rum colas from kitchen to den), but on first try it knocked against a door jam and spilled contents all over the rug. Mary was desperate.

Then, a hint: an ad for French sous-vétements from the gift section of the paper caught her eye.  Would she dare?

True, she knew he was proud on his once trim body which was getting a bit fleshy, though he often posed in the full length mirror, wistfully, in a decades old speedo. Alas, just a happy memory.  But those ads of muscular men posing in French underwear?  

Without a second thought, she selected from an tantalizing array;  there they were, a lingering hope to please his long gone football frame.

She eliminated those in delicate materials and ordered instead three that might appeal to his secret ego: a speedo-like black satin;  shimmery boxers with six pearl buttons down the front; and – for variety – a pair of silky baby blue boxer shorts sprinkled with fleur-de-lis.  

Before she could change her mind, she filled out the instructions, wrote a check, and sent it out  –  hoping she’d done the right thing.

Oh, why not.  It was Hobson’s choice. And when the package arrived, she still felt she had done the right thing – but, then wondering with a smile that drew a slight blush, what then would he think up for her upcoming birthday? No more plain housecoat or modest cotton mules? Tit for tat?  Perhaps their honeymoon wasn’t quite over yet. 

(Happy ending: it worked; Mary and John were both thrilled with the results.)

OK, go ahead & smile, amused at the solution for a Christmas gift, but also as a bonus, for a marital situation. Know your loved one and you’ll know how to please. If statistics are correct, there are plenty of people who puzzle any day of the week – holidays and gift-giving not excepting – over marriage and what beyond gifting it’s really all about. They might learn a lot from what an anonymous fellow wrote, not just for Christmas, but forever:

“Marriage is not what everyone thinks it is.  It’s not waking up early every morning to make breakfast and eat together.  It’s not cuddling in bed together until both of you peacefully fall asleep. It’s not a clean home and a homemade meal every day. No, it’s more. It’s someone who also messes the covers and elbows you in the face. It’s a few harsh words, fights and the silent treatment; it’s wondering if you’ve made the right decision about anything.

“It is, despite all off those things, the one thing you look forward to every day. It’s coming home to the same person you know loves and cares about you. It’s laughing about the time you accidentally did something stupid.

“It’s about eating the cheapest and easiest meal you can make and sitting down together at 10pm to eat because you both had a crazy day.  It’s when you have an emotional breakdown and your loved one holds you and tells you everything is going to be okay, and you believe it.

“It’s about still loving someone even though that person makes you absolutely insane.  Living with the person you love, fights about absolutely nothing, but it’s also having a love that people spend their whole lives looking for.  It’s not perfect and it’s not easy, but it’s amazing and comforting and the best thing you’ll ever experience.

“So go and find a photo of the person you love, then copy these thought and paste them to it; make it your loved one’s special day!”

How’s that for a unique and loving gift?

Now, a bit of a switch in honor of what’s to occur very soon,  through the words of some famous people:

“Christmas, my child, is love in action. Every time we love, every time we give rather than just take, it’s Christmas” – Dale Evans

“Every gift which is given, even though it be small, is in reality great if it is given with affection” – Pindar

“I love Christmas, not just because of the presents, but because of all the decorations and lights and the warmth of the season” – Ashley Tisdale

“He who has not Christmas in his heart will never find it under a tree” – Roy L. Smith

“Christmas isn’t a season. It’s a feeling” – Edna Ferber

Yes, it’s still time to consider some unique gifts; go ahead, take a chance and possibly have an even happier merry Christmas than you ever expected.