The nature of a gift.
My sister got a printer for Yule. A printer that does other things, too - a printer that not only prints, but scans, and copies, and collates. It is a giant, mammoth, techno-beast, and the little slots where the paper and cartridges are supposed to go in make it look like a massive gray box with a hungry mouth that just intends to....I don't know. Devour all comers.
She enlisted my help in putting it together. This is not supposed to be hard, is it? And technology should theoretically become easier the more advanced it is. Plug in all the plugs, put the appropriate things together, insert CD, clicky click, technomagick at hand!
No.
It doesn't fit together right, it is too big for the desk, it heaves and growls like a living thing, it spits ink out all over my shirt and face. It does not work. It will not work. We put in the CD and it gives us instructions that make no sense. Tech support mocks us. My delightful old aunt wandered in during the process and performed a rite to, ostensibly, create harmony between the living and the cyber, but it eludes us still.
After two hours of this, my sister banged her fist on the printer and announced, "This is not a gift! This is torture. And that's all it is."
And her words made me think. Made me think that so often gifts simply...aren't. We give them with implicit obligations (I deserve a thank you, at least) or (Surely so and so will be excited over this). We give gifts sometimes in expectation of a certain reaction, a gratefulness, sometimes even a gift in return. Occasionally, from relatives, I will hear this: "I didn't know what to get you, but this will at least be useful." (In return for my gift, I expect your use of it).
To a degree these expectations are unavoidable and even laudable. I love nothing more than giving something to someone I love for the sheer joy of seeing them happy, delighted, surprised. To say that I don't adore those reactions would be a blatant lie. But that said, a gift in my mind should demand nothing of the recipient, and give something at some cost to the giver. It should come with no strings attached, no expectations, no requirements, blissfully free of burdens. In a society where exchange is set in values, receiving something from sheer grace - "because I can, and because you are you" - is beautiful, and although "cost" or "sacrifice" is sometimes seen as a negative concept, the thought of giving a little of oneself to another, without the expectation of anything in return, enthralls me.
I want all my gifts this year to be like that.
She enlisted my help in putting it together. This is not supposed to be hard, is it? And technology should theoretically become easier the more advanced it is. Plug in all the plugs, put the appropriate things together, insert CD, clicky click, technomagick at hand!
No.
It doesn't fit together right, it is too big for the desk, it heaves and growls like a living thing, it spits ink out all over my shirt and face. It does not work. It will not work. We put in the CD and it gives us instructions that make no sense. Tech support mocks us. My delightful old aunt wandered in during the process and performed a rite to, ostensibly, create harmony between the living and the cyber, but it eludes us still.
After two hours of this, my sister banged her fist on the printer and announced, "This is not a gift! This is torture. And that's all it is."
And her words made me think. Made me think that so often gifts simply...aren't. We give them with implicit obligations (I deserve a thank you, at least) or (Surely so and so will be excited over this). We give gifts sometimes in expectation of a certain reaction, a gratefulness, sometimes even a gift in return. Occasionally, from relatives, I will hear this: "I didn't know what to get you, but this will at least be useful." (In return for my gift, I expect your use of it).
To a degree these expectations are unavoidable and even laudable. I love nothing more than giving something to someone I love for the sheer joy of seeing them happy, delighted, surprised. To say that I don't adore those reactions would be a blatant lie. But that said, a gift in my mind should demand nothing of the recipient, and give something at some cost to the giver. It should come with no strings attached, no expectations, no requirements, blissfully free of burdens. In a society where exchange is set in values, receiving something from sheer grace - "because I can, and because you are you" - is beautiful, and although "cost" or "sacrifice" is sometimes seen as a negative concept, the thought of giving a little of oneself to another, without the expectation of anything in return, enthralls me.
I want all my gifts this year to be like that.