Tiffany, Will You Marry Me?

If there was ever any doubt that my parents loved me, I’d only have to look as far as my Christmas, birthday, Easter, and even Thanksgiving bounty to understand the magnitude of their adoration.

Their children are all self-sustaining adults with professional careers.  Most families stop giving excessive gifts to their children once they reach drinking age.  After all, once you can legally sit in a bar and slug shot after shot after shot of tequila until you’re sleeping in your own vomit under the bar stools, why does anybody need things like new clothes or a sauté pan?

But not my family.  I sometimes wonder if they are embarrassed because, in reality, they hate the lot of us so they shower us with presents that collectively exceed the cost of an imported automobile to disguise their revulsion year after year. 

I’ve never liked the idea of gift wish lists because it seems so terminally bratty.  Very I want I want I want me me me.  So I refused to offer up the gift wish list for years.  Mom repeatedly complained that I was too difficult to buy for and if I’d just give her a list, it would be much easier for her to disguise her hatred.  She didn’t actually say that, but I know it’s what she meant.

Then one Christmas, I reviewed my bounty.  Socks.  Underwear.  Something intended for my living room wall that, in my opinion, would be better suited for the interior of a guest closet. 

So, I resigned.  I started creating lists of things that would be nice to have, but that I wouldn’t buy for myself.  Jewelry I didn’t need.  A trip I wouldn’t take.  Kitchen appliances I’d rarely use.  But when I gave mom the list, I also gave her explicit to the last detail instructions that the gifter not deviate in any way from the wish list, under any circumstances.  If I said orange, I meant orange.  If I said 7”, I did not mean 7 ½” or 6”.  I meant 7”.  I hate this about myself.  It makes the wish list look like something Mother Teresa would have produced.  But I hate having ugly things in my house more.  I may be spoiled, but it will hurt your feelings more if you get me a set of coasters and never see them again.

One birthday, in addition to a multitude of other gifts, I was at work when I received a large box with a return address that began “TCO”.  Ah, Tiffany.  It was another wonderful gift from mom.  Disregarding that pesky annoyance that was some report due in the next twenty minutes or so, I ripped that package open to reveal a signature teal box with its white satin ribbon. 

I paused.  I couldn’t think of anything this large that had ended up on my list.  All of the things on my Tiffany list were jewelry related.  I muffled my eyebrows as I opened the box. Inside was a porcelain vase.  Painted with rich purple flowers and detailed in a lovely shade of deep blue that I’d never want in my house.  It was perfectly, fantastically hideous.  I didn’t understand why Tiffany would have produced something so awful.  I racked my brain trying to figure out how this monstrosity had ended up on my list.  I was in physical pain.

I decided mom had thought it was pretty and took a chance.  And I had to thank the woman who brought me into this world, who gave me my chin and my voice, who hated me enough to buy me such a wonderful awful gift without her knowing how I felt.  I knew it was expensive.  I knew she thought it was beautiful.  I knew she thought she was doing me a favor.  And I knew that I had no choice but to display that tragic thing somewhere prominent so it could be admired by all.

I took a deep breath and made the call.  Dad answered, as he always does. I always picture him sitting at the computer playing a video game with one hand on the phone at all times.  Just in case someone might call.  Perhaps so he can feel the phone’s vibration before he hears the ring and click that “talk” button before the other person has had a chance to finish crying or eating a turkey sandwich and he can catch them in the middle of something they didn’t want him to know they do.

“Hi, dad.  I wanted to call and thank you for the vase!”  I smiled for the proper effect of deception.

“Vase?  What vase?”

“The one you sent me?  From Tiffany?  For my birthday?  Next week?”
 
“I don’t know anything about any vase.  Let me get your mother.”  He holds the phone a polite-in-his-world four inches from his mouth to scream “Elizabeth!” more into my ear than into the house where mom might actually hear him.

Mom picks up.  “Yes?  What’s going on, hun.  I’m doing the ironing.”  I don’t understand why retired people need to iron.  Isn’t that one of the perks of retirement?  Sitting around in wrinkled t-shirts and flip flops all the time?

“Hi.  I wanted to thank you for the vase.  It’s really lovely.”

“Oh, sure!”  She’s not paying attention. 

“I wonder.  What made you decide to buy it?  I don’t think it was on the list, was it?”

“Wait.  Did you say ‘vase’?”

“Yes.  This vase.  With the purple flowers.”

“Purple flowers?  I didn’t get you any vase with any purple flowers!  I got you earrings!”

“This is definitely not earrings.”

“Why would I get you a vase?  And why is it there so early?  They told me it would be there closer to your birthday.  I’m really upset now!  I’m going to have to call them!”

Mom has used the “F word” about seven times in her entire life.  She thinks it’s a very special word.  A delicate thing you only use for really special, unique, and extraordinary situations, like fine china and crystal.  I suspect she used it that eighth time after she hung up the phone.

She called back within 10 minutes.

“Well.  Here’s what we think happened.  I ordered it by phone and they think the sales girl inverted the product number, so you got the wrong item. Even though I know I said ‘earrings’.  That idiot probably was busy filing her nails or something.  I bet she voted for Clinton.”  I couldn’t let her spin off into a political tirade about how all the morally repugnant and uninformed people always voted democrat regardless of who was on the ticket.  And they were probably all lawyers, too.  Since all lawyers are scum sucking pigs and before I knew it, lunch time would have come and gone and I’d still be enduring a tirade about the impending collapse of America due to people who wore pigtails in the 60s.  She’s not a big talker, unless you start talking politics, lawyers, or business.

“What did they say?”

“Oh. Right. They’re going to send you the earrings I actually ordered.  But they said also to keep the vase as an apology.  I really laid into that girl about how that gift got there so early.  I was very insistent with that Clinton-lover and told her I wanted to make sure it wouldn’t get there too early.  I mean, a day or so is fine, but your birthday isn’t for another week!  How can a business be run like that?  It’s like they don’t even care about their—“

I cut her off.  “Oh, really?  They are letting me keep it?  I don’t even like the thing!”

“I know.  I thought that was pretty nice myself.  Anyhow, happy birthday!  The earrings should be there in a few days.”

“Excellent. Thank you for everything, mom.  I’ll let you know when I get them.”

I now have the hideous vase displayed prominently in a bookcase in my sitting room.  I bring it out every time I have dinner guests, using it as a water pitcher, and tell them why I’ll always love Tiffany.