Gift giving

My daughter's boyfriend's parents went to Morocco during the summer and brought back what she said were "tons of leather bags" and necklaces, from which they asked her to pick. She picked a brown beaded and silver necklace and orange bag with a lovely Moroccan-style stitching design. For me. I promptly felt I "had" to wear the necklace the next day at work. It was lovely, even if I have 100 brown stone necklaces. The bag is beautiful, and large enough for me to fit in all my junk. The only problem is that it stinks like camel urine or something similar - some leather smells great, and some stinks horribly. This has a stench. Enough to put me off leather goods for a while. But I put all my stuff in it and took it to work. I met my daughter yesterday and she remarked, "Oh you're wearing it?" which I'm sure made her feel grateful that I don't shun her gifts.

I don't shun any gifts. Gifts are gifts.

Hubby, on the other hand, doesn't think like I do. If he doesn't like a gift, even from a loved one, he will discard it like a two-bit whore.

Same daughter brought us a house plant for inside our home. The wooden strangely-shaped thing it was in, wasn't my style or color, but it was a gift, and I proudly displayed it in the living room. On Friday my daughter's future in-laws were meeting us for the first time. Hubby put the plant in the bathroom, well out of view of guests.

This produced an argument.

"Why is this in the bathroom?" I asked

"Because it's a piece of shit."

That makes sense. Pieces of shit certainly belong in the bathroom, but this "piece" was from my daughter. It didn't.

After some loud words were exchanged, I won (YAY!) and the plant remained in the livingroom but on the other side, on the side of the couch, where it wouldn't show so prominently.


He did the same thing with this hideous brown metal clock my son-in-law got for us before he became our son-in-law. After a few months Hubby took it out of our living room and placed it in the storage room. I argued with him about it, but not as vehemently as I would had he been my own son.

When my daughter's future in-laws arrived at our home Friday night, we felt like royalty as each one beared some sort of gift in their hands - the father held a bottle of champagne, the mother - a dozen long-stemmed roses, the husband-to-be - a giant caramel cake and the brother - a giant basket filled to the brim with assorted high-quality chocolates and wine.

I snickered to Hubby - "Bet you're not taking THAT into the storage room.."