Thought I Was Done

I spent about two hours yesterday afternoon, meticulously wrapping the gifts I have purchased for my wife.   I thought I was therefore, DONE with wrapping.  But, unfortunately, now I must wrap around 1/2 of the gifts my wife has acquired for family and friends.  I keep hoping to sneak out of this task, but.... it never happens.  

Since the time of us first beginning to date, long, long ago, my wife has known me to be a quite fastidious and meticulous wrapper of gifts.  I am.... I guess.... but the full picture is  a bit different from the presumed ideas my wife holds:

I AM extremely meticulous in wrapping gifts.  I work very diligently to have each creased edge sharp and defined.  The paper has to fit tightly around the gift, and the seams of the edges of the paper need to be parallel and matching.  I work to have the folded ends of the wrapping paper look extremely precise and fully symmetrical top, bottom, and side.  I always use tape that is as "invisible" as possible on the wrapping paper.  I also use abundant ribbon, often multiple strands in each direction on the present.  The cut ends of the ribbon need to have an even splicing where they meet underneath each gift.  

I have to admit, my wrapped presents do look rather professional.  

But.... I hate wrapping gifts.  

Back when this "need" to wrap meticulously developed in me, I was a poor undergraduate student whose only "earnings" were from a 10 hour a week, part time job I was able to be hired for in a lab at my undergraduate university.  This, of course, meant I did not have a helluva lot of money.  Scholarships kept the financial hounds at bay regarding college, but still, that was not a lot of money.  

So, my meager earnings meant my gifts that I could get for my family and friends were not particularly extravagant.  They WERE heartfelt!  But, they were NOT extravagant by any means.  So, I began to try to help my meager offerings.... by "prettying up the pig" so-to-speak.  I would find the most unique, budget friendly paper I could find, and buy ribbon of whatever clearance colors I could find (and even save bows from presents I received for recycling) and then CAREFULLY, oh so carefully wrap each gift as perfectly and as ornately as I could muster so as to have it at least look "good" when they received it prior to opening.   Family and friends began to notice and comment on the looks of the presents wrapped and this helped me feel a sense of relief because I think it was a way to at least SHOW them I care, even though the gift was modest.  

I have kept up the meticulous wrapping ever since, even though now it is mostly just for my wife and the presents I buy her... as I can usually sidestep other wrapping needs, because my wife will handle it.  Except.... at Christmas, where she requires me to wrap my fair share.  

My wife's wrapping style is..... how to put this..... more.... "homespun".  There is almost never a creased edge, there are loose parts of wrapping paper, rather wonky angles.... etc.  And I think her wrapping is beautiful.  Our disparate wrapping styles had us need to devise a plan when our kids were younger.  I ended up wrapping all the gifts that were from Santa for the kids, and even wrote out the gift tags (usually with red or green ink) with a rather ornate script using my left hand (I am right handed) to keep the kids from recognizing my penmanship.  My wife wrapped all the gifts for the kids that were from US, and they had the "homespun" look. We both wrote out those tags in our normal script, using a normal blue or black pen. 

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Santa smoked a pipe.  So, maybe that is reason enough for me to reignite my hobby!  Obviously, the prior statement is meant a bit "tongue-in-cheek".  But, sadly so.

The Norman Rockwell painting of Santa I have topped this post with is indeed my own personal favorite of the many Santa images Rockwell painted.  To me, this always best represented Santa.  It is interesting that since I allowed my beard and mustache to grow unfettered instead of neatly trimmed..... my own beard and mustache has a similar robust quality to it as is seen in this version of Santa. If I had known it would grow that well, I would have stopped shaping and trimming it long ago.  Unfortunately, though, I still have too many aspects of my own facial fur that are gunmetal grey  yet to be a respectable Santa... but if these remaining patches do whiten up like the rest... I think I could be a potential future Santa. 

I am still contemplating a return to my pipes.  I have been on a few different occasions today, opening up different pouches of some of my more aromatic blends and just enjoying their gentle notes within the pouch.  Sniffing the pouches has helped me to better recall some of the feelings and flavors of the various blends.  Still no nigh time dream memories as of yet, even though I do wish they would return.  

PipeTobacco