Regift Boomerang

For those who know me well, you might know that I am an avid regifter. It's shameful, I know. Not one of my best attributes at all. But, if I am given something and I don't like it, I am not the type of girl to hold onto it and wear/hang/put it out in obligatory fashion when the giver comes over. I usually stash it in a drawer and then give it to someone else. Sometimes as a present, but more often as a simple offering because I like them and I think they would like my unwanted gift. Maybe they do....Or maybe they regift it to someone else. I don't know.

I do have a shred of sentimentality in me. If the gift truly means something or is symbolic in some way and I don't like it, I still hold onto it. I'm talking more about the regifting of common everyday gifts here, so let me make the disclaimer that I'm not completely heartless.

But, for example, I have received a proliferation of items that depict my first tattoo--Picasso's hands holding flowers drawing--throughout my life. I got this tattoo when I was 18 years old, and while I don't loathe it now, it no longer feels like me. However, the stuff keeps pouring in: erasers, pencils, coffee mugs, notepads, posters, stationary. Most of it is from my mom (bless her heart), but sometimes it'll come from someone else. I smile when I receive it and stash it in a drawer to regift it.

This past weekend we attended Adam's Aunt's funeral. Aunt Marilyn was the best recipient of my regifts. She accepted all gifts with pure joy and thankfulness--an earnest joy and thankfulness. She was a very simple woman who appreciated simple things; she was also single her whole life, and I feel that when gifts came to her she truly felt part of a family and loved. I cannot begin to explain the large number of gifts that were given to me by my family that were recycled to Aunt Marilyn, and she loved each and every one. In fact, at the luncheon after the funeral and burial, Grandma Watson (Marilyn's mother) explained to me how much Marilyn loved a throw blanket that Adam and I had given her years ago for Christmas. Well, that was actually a gift my mom and stepdad had given us, but in a small apartment that already had three throw blankets, we didn't need another and regifted it to Aunt Marilyn. Grandma said how once Marilyn was wheelchair bound, that throw blanket was on her lap 24/7.

Aunt Marilyn had been in an assisted living facility for the past eight years. There wasn't much to clean out of her room, but Adam's mom, Marcia, came up to me on Saturday and handed me a mug of Picasso's hands holding flowers and said, "This was in Marilyn's room and we thought you should have it." Marcia didn't know that I had given the mug to Marilyn (or if she did, she didn't say), and she definitely didn't know that the mug came from my mother about nine years ago at Christmas. But now the mug is back in my hands, and, since it is a relic of Aunt Marilyn and symbolizes the hilarity of my regifting boomeranging back in my face, the mug is now safely situated in our cabinet where it will stay.

I guess when I regift comes back at you, it's the universe's way of saying you're meant to keep it.

Rest in Peace, Aunt Marilyn. I'll drink my coffee and tea from my mug, which was your mug, which is now again my mug and think of you.