A MUST for my brother's gifts
Is there one in every family? I thought it was just mine, but after a funny conversation during our gift exchange at work last week, I have to wonder.
It all started with the mention of gift bags – which not only look pretty, but can be a huge time-saver. A coworker said, “Gift bags are a MUST for my stepdaughter. I never wrap presents for her. Otherwise, she has to painstakingly remove every single piece of tape, and damage the wrapping paper as little as possible–”
ME: “Oh my gosh, my brother does that!”
COWORKER: “Yes, it’s like she has to save the paper, but she never reuses it!”
ME: “Neither does my brother!”
IN UNISON: “It drives everyone nuts!”
“My mom does that too,” another coworker said. “But she actually does reuse the paper.”
Coworker #1 and I agreed that this was different, as there was a reason for preserving the paper.
Yet another coworker wondered how old these relatives are, thinking they were children.
COWORKER #1: “She’s twenty-one!”
ME: “He’s forty!”
Somehow, I bet this guy is one of those who unwraps s-l-o-o-o-w
Coworker #1 theorizes that her stepdaughter does this because the longer it takes her to unwrap her gift, the longer she gets to be the center of attention.
I’m not sure what my brother’s motivation is. Maybe he just likes to savor the moment and the anticipation. He’s unwrapped presents this way since he was a little kid, and after a few years of suffering through packages that took him a half-hour or more to open, the family got so that we simply moved on and ignored him, only returning attention to him once he got his gift unwrapped. He’s been married for six or seven years, and his wife and mother-in-law still give him wrapped gifts. Invariably, he’s still sitting on the floor with unopened presents long after everyone else is done and people are leaving.
I, on the other hand, dig into my gifts with gusto. Paper flies, and is always torn through the middle. When I was a little kid, my parents always found it amusing. I throw the paper less now, but I still have fun.
What about you? Do you tear into your presents like a tornado, or savor the anticipation? Do you have a family member who unwraps presents piece-of-tape by meticulously-removed-piece-of-tape? Or if you’re “that guy,” what’s your reason for dragging it out so long? Curious minds want to know!
Whatever holiday you celebrate, I hope you have (or had) a wonderful one! Or if you don’t celebrate, here’s hoping you at least enjoyed a day off work, or good pay if you didn’t even get that.
Photos via Microsoft Office Clipart
