Present Tense

First it was the Indian festival season, now there is the wedding season and soon it will be the Western festival season. What is common between all of them? Gifts. And of course shopping too, but that makes for another story.

How do you pick a gift? Seriously, how? Of all the social customs, I find this is to be the toughest. It isn't even something which you get better at with age (as if there is anything like that, other than the record for the longest cough). It was so much more easier when we were kids, when our parents would pick the gift. And the choices too, so many! I mean any thing that you don't possess, gifted by someone else classifies as a good gift, when you are small ("oh wow! a shiny ball of yarn!").

But now, there are so many conditions that you have to follow!

• The most important one - put some thought into it. Easier said than done. Whatever happened to just stuffing some cash into an envelope and giving it away? I find that to be very thoughtful, it involves so many thoughts! You thought of going to the ATM, you thought of buying an envelope (or reusing an existing one, I am not judging) and most importantly, you thought of not wasting their space and your money on something which they will anyway gift away to someone else, in case they don't like it! How much more thoughtful can you get!
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• Gender specific - oh boy this is a toughie! As kids, when you were invited to a birthday party, all your parents had to do was rush to the nearest store which sold toys and pick one. As simple as that. Sure there were some stereotypes followed - like girls got the dolls and guys got the balls (pun unintended), but hey, it never hurt anyone, did it? This was before the times of political correctness. But now what do you do? Books are the most gender neutral gifts but then again, how many people read these days? Even if they do, how many appreciate a book as a gift? (Refer to the above point about thoughtfulness of the gift)
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• The budget - something that not only tests your math skills, but also your memory. Jot down these questions in case you are weak in this particular area. "What did I get from them last time?", "What did they gift others in a similar situation?", "How much do I earn?", "How much do they earn?", "Will this be an individual gift or will I be pooling in with other people?" and finally the most important one - "How much do I like them?" Your final budget is the sum of all these figures multiplied by Pi and divided by the number of years of your life left, after going through the mental agony of thinking of these answers.
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• The occasion - broadly classified into birthdays, wedding and miscellaneous. What comes under the miscellaneous category, you ask? A: Anniversaries, Farewells, Promotions, House warming ceremony, naming ceremony - basically the events that you would attend only in case of a gun being pointed to your head or the person in question being a blood relative/someone very close to you. The festivals are easier, at least for us Indians (not into business) - a box of sweets or dry fruits, depending on the occasion. Among the rest, I consider birthdays to be the most important - it comes every year and is a judge of what kinda relationship you have with the gifter-giftee. Thoughtful and expensive - consider marriage; non existent or lame and recycled - consider divorce.

I am sure I have left out many small details which are a part of the procedure of selecting a gift. For example the protocol for giving flowers - roses/ lilies/ garbera? Or the corporate (read useless) gifts - pen stand/ photo frame / coffee mug? Or the timeless dilemma that boggles all new home owners - "What the hell are we going do with all these clocks?" This gift giving business is hard!

P.S.: Now do you see the usefulness of the cash-in-envelope gift?