My husband, Walt, and I struggle with anniversary gift giving. Early on, we tried the anniversary gifts by year guides, but they didn’t help. We didn’t want what we were supposed to get, we already had what the list suggested, or we contorted ourselves so much to match the list that the whole affair was exhausting. After a few years trying to make it work, we decided to wing it.
Once in a while, we forget about our anniversary completely until we get a card from his mom. It’s on the wall calendar in the kitchen, it’s 9/9, and it’s three weeks before Walt’s birthday. And yet it somehow slips through the cracks. Then there was the year we convinced ourselves that if we bought art for our house, it would cancel out gift giving. We bought it a month ahead and had too long to think. Finally, we couldn’t take it anymore and ended up buying each other something.
After twenty years of anniversaries, there is one gift which by and far blows away any other. It is The World’s Tiniest Alpaca That is Maybe a Llama (TWTATIMAL). Walt found it on Amazon. I believe it is supposed to be bronze. It is an inch tall when it stands on its tippy toes. The poor fellow should be able to stand, but he flops on his side like a fainting goat. Walt bought it because he knows I like alpacas. The seller did not mention how big it was, so Walt got quite the surprise when it arrived. To his credit, instead of panicking and finding something at the grocery store, he wrapped it nicely and gave it to me, albeit while sounding somewhat apologetic.
My experience has been that when someone receives a gift and says, “It’s the thought that counts,” it’s said in disappointment. My poor husband was so excited to get me something I liked and had no idea it was so tiny. Hearing him explain all of this, I couldn’t help but fall a little in love with my tiny alpaca-maybe-llama…and a little more in love with the person who gave him to me.
Thinking While Typing 