What We Gift and Get

Adam Calder
Wheatsfield Produce Manager

Recently, I stumbled across an essay written in 1844 by Ralph Waldo Emerson. The essay is simple titled “Gifts”, and is merely three pages long. Within those pages, Emerson muses on what it takes to be a good gift giver and receiver.

Why are we so pleased when we are generous, but vexed when we must repay debt? Emerson argues that the difference is in the choosing. We choose to gift; we are burdened with debt. When confronted with a situation where gifts are expected from him, he stumbles over the available options until the opportunity to gift has passed. Do you give a gift of utility, such as shoes for a person wearing none? Or do you proudly offer the temporary, delicate beauty of a flower, in defiance of all the utility the cold countenance of the world has to offer?

He further ponders, if it is indeed the burden of thought that is the important part of the gift, then does that not devalue the shoes given to the shoeless? No thought was required; you saw someone without shoes so you did not need to think at all on what to give them. Emerson sees gifts like this as a relief, since they eliminate all the other gifting options. “Necessity does everything well,” Emerson said. Does this make the gift less valuable? Does looking far and wide for the perfectly beautiful but utility-free flower make it more valuable?

He also mentions a gifting rule a friend once told him: that we might convey to some person that which properly belonged to his character, and was easily associated with him in thought. Emerson claims that these tokens of thought and compliment are actually barbarous, and that the only true gift is a portion of thyself. “Thou must bleed for me,” Emerson said. A farmer gifts his crops; a sailor, the bounty of the sea; a painter, a portrait. Emerson argues that these gifts are more of an index of the givers worth and merit, than say going to a shop and buying jewelry that represents not your life or talent, but that of the jeweler.

Emerson starts one of his paragraphs by saying “He is a good man, who can receive a gift well. We are either glad or sorry at a gift, and both emotions are unbecoming.” He describes his own turmoil upon receiving a gift he dislikes, asserting that such a gift is actually an invasion of his independence. He also details the feelings of joy he gets from a perfect gift, for that means the giver looked into his heart and saw his true desire was for the object, and not for the giver.

To be a true gift, the waters between giver and recipient must be level, so the donor can give, and the receiver can trade back, an equal amount of emotion. So, giving something to a completely magnanimous person, in Emerson’s opinion, will never work. As soon as you give something to this person, you already are indebted to them because of their magnanimity.

Admittedly, most people do not think this deeply about gift giving or receiving. Emerson’s essay touches on some fascinating concepts that have likely been bedeviling humans as long as we have been around to give each other gifts. His point seems to be that gifting is, at best, a mixed blessing, and is very much a part of being human that we all go through, so don’t stress out about it too much this holiday season.