The Importance of a Thank You

The quilts that were made this year for the children of a niece and a nephew have been the subjects of several entries, and they are present, albeit indirectly, yet again in this entry. 

 

Many of you will recognize the feeling of anxiety that accompanies the sending of a precious package.  First, there is the expected sense of loss.  Something that has been worked on for a long time is being almost literally flung to the four winds.  Where exactly is it at any given moment?  Is it lying, neglected, in a corner?  Has it bounced out of a truck and landed at the feet of a hungry omnivore?  Was it sent to the correct address?  Next, there is the fear that it might not be welcomed.  What if they were merely being polite, and they hate whatever art form you have sent?  What if the colors/shapes were all wrong? 

 

Then the days may pass without a word, and the fears become almost visible and audible.  You picture the gift lying amid crumbled tissue paper still in its box at the back of the junk closet.  You can hear the polite argument, "It's your relative.  You figure out what to write.  Heaven knows, I can't!" 

 

Then the mailman comes, and there is an envelope with familiar handwriting and/or a familiar return address.  You may hesitate to open it because maybe your fears were right and it's one of those, "Umm, ahh, thank you, mumble mumble" ones.  Open it!  There is nothing as sweet as a well written thank you note.  Unless they are thank you "notes" like the two I received.

 

First one to arrive was from my niece.  H and her husband own a catamaran and teach people how to dive and take them out on diving adventures in the beautiful waters around Florida.  For their son I made Liquid Assets on the Loose.  When the mailman dropped off a package from H, I was a little confused; it wasn't quite what I expected, and I had a moment of panic.  Did she think she had to send me a gift?

 

Upon opening the package, I found a cigar box.  A beautiful wooden cigar box complete with real hinges and clasp!  First, I have to explain that my grandfather always had cigar boxes around his work area.  For one of my birthdays, he painted a cigar box with a picture of a rose.  For me, an awkward, chubby, buck-toothed kid.  Then, this year in my painting class, we noticed that our teacher had a number of gorgeous cigar boxes.  Each one held neatly organized art supplies - pastels or fountain pens or water colors in tubes.  For a gift, she gave us each one.  Cigar boxes are awesome.

 

Anyway, I opened the cigar box from H and found it packed tightly with red tissue paper.  Knowing that meant I should take care, I gently removed layer after layer.  Here's what I found:

 

 

The note you see is from H and it's a lovely thank you note.  Behind that note is a another one in which H wrote that the shells were some favorites from her son.  Wow, what a treasure!  Thank you, H, C, and G!

 

Now I have to admit that I did what I consider a terrible thing.  It seemed as though a lot of time had passed, and I hadn't heard from my nephew's family so I e-mailed him (gasp!) to inquire if they had indeed received the package (yes, UPS had delivered it, but maybe a passer-by thought, "Hey, Christmas goodies!" and had absconded with it).  Poor A emailed me very quickly to reassure me.  The package made it (even though I think I had the wrong address after all).

 

Not too long afterward, I received an envelope from K, his wife.  In it were two photos, one of each little girl on her own quilt (one had both girls) and a DVD disk with a brief thank you written on one side and instructions on the other side.  Bless their hearts, they had filmed their older daughter unwrapping her quilt.  What a delight!!!  The part I liked best was when she dragged the quilt off to her room at the end.  Everyone in the family was there as this was filmed, and we could hear them all and their comments very clearly.  Whew, how original and how very meaningful to us! 

 

It makes me sad to think that many people today think an e-mail thank you is enough or a card with one or two sentences (sometimes without specifically mentioning the gift!) will do the job.  Those people don't realize the gifts my family sent me.  Those people should see how many times I have looked at those special seashells that my great nephew probably picked up on the beach himself and chose to send to me.  Or how many times I have smiled at and touched the two photographs of my great nieces.  Or read H's note.  Or watched the DVD.  Or smiled at the cigar box. 

 

Now those were genuine thank you notes!