The Gift of Fun

“It’s not the gift; it’s the thought behind it.”

You’ve heard that before. Well, there’s a story that tells of these two brothers putting a lot of thought in the giving of a pair of pants that they gave back and forth to each Christmas. First, the pants were tied to a car wheel and run over snow and ice, wrapped in a lovely box, and given. When the other brother got them the next Christmas, he placed those same pants in a form where wet cement was poured and allowed to dry. They were presented that year along with a sledge hammer.
The next year they were placed in the framing of a small tool shed, and the entire shed had to be ripped apart in order to get to the pants. Now, the next year, the same old sorry, miserable pair of pants sat in the front seat of a car which was demolished, compressed into a flattened piece of metal. It took a tractor and crowbars to get to that same pair of pants. Again, it wasn’t the gift—it was the fun and joy in giving it.
My family had a ball (literally) that was about the size of a ping pong ball that traveled to each other’s houses during the Holidays and was always placed in the host’s bed so that you laid on it that first night. That ball made its way around Canada every Christmas, forgotten every year, only remembered when the “picked-on” would lay on it! That reminds me, I wonder where that ball is...hmmm…
John Whittier said this about giving: “Somehow not only for Christmas, but all the long year through, the joy that you give to others is the joy that comes back to you.