Friday, May 1, 2009
My Birthday Cake: For Sale
It might be true that a gift should never become a commodity. When this rule gets broken, people get annoyed. Peter Everett told me about someone he knew who donated a bunch of famous old paintings to the Springville Museum of Art. It was a gift and everyone was happy- until the owner of the museum turned around and sold the paintings off. Of course he has his reasons but that family was ticked. I guess I would be too. My mother in law enlisted many helpers and invested many hours in creating a beautiful quilt to give my wife and me on our wedding day. I got fifty bucks last week when I sold it on ebay… not really but boy would I have made some people angry if I did, right? So tell me what you think. Is it improper to turn a gift into a commodity? Do you have examples in support or opposition to this idea?
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It's only wrong if you still like the person who gave it to you.
ReplyDeleteLike if John Doe gave me a necklace when we were 15 year old sweethearts and now I haven't seen him in 10 years and I'm married to Josh Egbert who gave me something much more shiny and beautiful that is on my finger, I can sell the ugly necklace from John Doe because it currently has no emotional value.
But if I sold my shiny ring from my current husband, I'd be a horrible person and everyone would judge me. But that's just because I still love my husband. And you still love your "mother-in-law and many others". So, only sell gifts from people you don't care about.
Also, is re-gifting making it a commodity? Some people I know got 20 a hundred crock pots for the wedding and they gave some away.....
I think that the gift must be taken in the context of purpose. For example, the gift to the Springville Museum of Art was intended for Springville's collection, not for it to be sold for profitable gain. Same with the example of the birthday cake, it is made for your celebration of life, not for your profitable gain. The necklace spoken of by Amy served it's purpose and now no longer does. There are obviously more valuable gifts and less valuable. When I speak of value, I of course refer to the importance we place on gifts. I also refer to the intention of the individual gifting such gift. I think intention also weighs heavily on the importance of the gift. Using your quilt example: the quilt my mother made for us wedding is more important the the quilts my grandma and Sarah's grandma made for us. In turn, those quilts are more important and significant to us than the cheap quilts someone picked up at Wal-Mart, which now brings the discussion back full circle.
ReplyDeleteIf I gave someone a crock pot and found out that they had 7 already but that they kept it so they wouldn't hurt my feelings, I would tell them they're silly and encourage them to regift or return the crock pot. On the other hand, If my daughter decides to sell the homemade blocks that I spent so many hours on, I would feel sad. Time and energy spent on the gift put it in a slightly different category. The giver is at a higher risk of being hurt when the receiver doesn't like it but also has a higher potential to feel joy in the giving if the receiver does like it.
ReplyDeleteFor some reason the extra step of time spent earning money then buying the gift makes it less personal.
So Amy told me I had to come here and make a comment because I, with some others, make such lame comments on another blog, she thought we could pretty much bedevil you and your blog too. So here I am. Maybe the others will join.
ReplyDeleteMt. Ridge Junior High? We may be related. I was the soccer coach at Lone Peak and I know lots, and lots of Mountain Ridgers. Hmmmm.
About commodities and gifts. All I know is if you have the physical thing in your hands, given the economic turmoil, the incredible 11 trillion dollar debt and the printing of unfunded dollars, everything from equities to treasury notes, to municipal treasury notes, and even cash is going to be pretty worthless. The only thing that will have value are physical commodities. You know, corn, aluminum, gold, paintings, chalk, erasers, land, silver, wheat, olive oil. Buy all you can get. And hold on to them for dear life.
By next year at this time they'll all be more valuable than any gift you could give. Even Aunt Emma's painting.
When someone brings books in to the library to donate, we try to explain that our space at the library is limited and that we'll look at the books, determine whether or not we can use them, use the ones we can use, and sell the rest. Then we ask if the person wanting to donate is okay with that. If not, they can find somewhere else to donate the books. My boss sometimes advises people with really nice books to wait to donate them until we have more space.
ReplyDeleteIn theory, when we give a gift we should do so without regard to how the receiver will use or not use the gift. However, if you even think about selling that quilt on e-bay, you are in the biggest trouble of your life! Interesting how different theory and practice actually are, isn't it? I think often the receiver has no concept of how much time, effort, money, or whatever else has been expended in the giving of the gift. We've probably all had the experience of feeling under-appreciated. What we often fail to realize is how often we are under-appreciative!
So, I recall hearing not too long ago about a fellow who donated a kidney to his wife so she wouldn't die - and then his wife filed for divorce. So he was suing the wife for damages in the amount of a couple lots of millions. Either that, or she could give him his kidney back. Kind of along with that whole gift/commodity thing...
ReplyDeleteWow i can say that this is another great article as expected of this blog.Bookmarked this site..
ReplyDeleteOil Paintings