Yes, tis the season for that dreaded word that pops in our heads, uninvited, as we slip off the ribbon of a well-thought out gift.

Return.

Pops in there right before “smile and be gracious” and right after “regift.” Sometimes this season, with the hustle and bustle and list making and checking off frenzie, has us in such knots that we settle for our gift giving. Out of obligation or frustration, we buy or give something that is “good enough” when a loving, heart-felt note or a “sorry still looking” would have been more honest, meaningful–and perhaps better.

As a wise old sage, mother, grandmother, wife, friend, I have gained a new perspective on gift giving this year.

I’ve realized what we should be doing is not just exchanging gifts but sharing our hearts. Taking the time, to stop and say “I love you” with something tangible that late in deep, dark February or on the July 4th or a hot day in August, the receiver will remember our thoughts of them, and smile.

In Merriam-Webster style, a gift  is “a thing given willingly to someone without expected payment; a present.”

Christian tradition for this holiday has the custom of giving and receiving presents to remind us of the presents given to the Messiah by the Wise Men: frankincense, gold and myrrh. Similarly, in Jewish tradition, as Hanukkah often falls at the same time of year, there is also the tradition of giving gelt, or money, to children and young adults as Hanukkah gifts. Probably because of the Christian dominance of spending, wrapping, sale-peddling on every street corner, at every store in every mall and all over Amazon, the gelt tradition has evolved to Christmas-like gift giving on the eight days of candle lighting.

In both traditions, I have a strong suspicion that many of the religious implications for exchanging presents has gotten buried in piles of torn wrapping paper and under mounds of lists of what we want, ask for and think we deserve.

Long before Judeo-Christian religions took over the helm of gift-giving, Roman philosopher Seneca wrote, around 40 AD, “A gift consists not in what is done or given, but in the intention of the giver or doer.”

A gift is simply that. A present to another from its giver. Often it is nothing you expected, wanted or perhaps even considered.  Just something someone who loves and cares about you thought about and chose. It is not your money hard spent but theirs, and if it is not anything you dreamed of or would have picked in 100 years, there is no harm/no foul in actually keeping it.  Just to remind you that that someone took the time to buy you a present.

The irony of my thoughts here is I am the queen of returns.  I have said I would and could return anything but my children. (Sorry, Marshall.) I’ve returned new cars, worn shoes, stale cereal, whistling tea kettles that didn’t; had a B+ essay changed to an A, had new roofs torn off and redone and on and on.

But this year,  I received a gift that stopped me in my tracks.  It’s the lock, pictured above. My husband chose it and gave it to me. It is about the size of a flip phone, weighs close to five pounds and the longer I look at it, it may be my favorite gift this year. When I opened it, I will admit I was sort of  looking for the sweet note tucked in the corner in his nearly illegible handwritten scribbling professing “the key to my heart” or “forever yours” but after nearly 40 years of marriage, I knew better. And come to find out the real intention was better. When I peered at him quizzacally, in the midst of ribbons unraveling and excited cries from my grandbabies to “Look at this, Ya Ya,” he said, “I saw it and just thought it was cool.”

And it is. And I love it. It’s a gift.  No uterior motive.  No exchange policy. No months of requests or hints on my part. Simply a completely unexpected present with no special message or intent.  He just thought of me.

And gave me a gift.

And all those cynics out there that think it attaches to my ball and chain, y’all hush up.  I like how I feel about this lock and I am going to ride that feeling as long as I can.