"Gift giving sometimes is a form of telepathy or character analysis. I’ve given many unimportant gifts, small things that probably missed their mark. I imagine the recipient pointing at a weirdly gone wrong gift—“What even is it? It/me, it/me? You’re kidding!” Sometimes I’ve tried to make gifts speak for me, and this can result in miscommunication. One friend said I gave things I wanted myself, and that was true. I needed to work on that. On the other hand, it wouldn’t have been good to give things I didn’t want myself. Still, I needed to more adequately imagine the life and needs of the person I was giving to. I’ve given gifts so wrongheaded that in retrospect they’re almost funny. For years, I gave Japanese yukatas (cotton bathhouse robes)—because I loved those robes myself. I’m pretty sure those gifts were not appreciated. Then I went through a phase of giving orchids to people who didn’t want to take care of them or who lived in dark houses. Recently I gave a family a Morgan horse saved from the kill pen. That was as thrilling for me as it was for them. A wonderful horsewoman offered to give the Morgan a home, and I was able to buy him less than an hour before he would have been tagged for slaughter. Her daughter is training the horse, they send me updates, and it’s been lovely to see them enjoying the horse and see that he now has a good life.
As for what I’ve loved to receive—well, there are the big gifts and the small. A MacArthur Fellowship was an extraordinary gift—it had the potential to be life-changing. It was my mother who told me I’d gotten it. My husband and I were on a cross-country trip, completely disconnected for weeks, and the Foundation couldn’t reach me. A friend who’d seen the announcement in the paper had told my mother, but she had no way to reach me. I finally called her, and she said, “Did you hear the great news?” Being told by your mother that you’d won a MacArthur is kind of unreal, like something from a dream. In retrospect, that was the sweetest aspect. She shared my happiness so deeply. It’s rare to have someone who does.
That was a singular thing, a gift that honored my work, but most of my thinking about presents centers on the small, material objects we exchange as a form of silent communication. I’m absurdly comforted by material objects. It has nothing to do with commodity value and everything to do with time, endurance, and love. I can look around any room in our house and see objects that friends, students, family members have given, and seeing these things brings the giver vividly to mind. It isn’t sentimental, it’s deeper than that. I’m typing this is in my “email study,” and behind me are two puppets from India, a gift from one of my oldest friends. She also gave us a comforter that we use a lot. I don’t think she realizes that we’ve enjoyed it so much. Who knows, maybe some people are liking what I’ve given without me knowing. The giver can’t control the gift. Words, language, can fall so far short, and the objects we exchange imply and resonate without resorting to words. That’s part of their power for me.
“… Giving it away / doesn’t make a thing a gift.” Those lines are from “Malus Domestica,” a poem that’s partly about waterboarding, and the lines refer to confessions extracted through torture. A gift given under duress isn’t a gift. Gifts also fail if they’re chosen in an offhand, thoughtless manner; if they’re a leftover, something the giver didn’t want herself; or if they’re in any sense stingy. A true gift conveys affection, trust, and esteem. It can say, “I know you, and I thought you’d like this,” or, “I love this, and I wanted you to have this because I love you.”
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