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In-laws and the Greeting Card Arms Race
Rosemary and I have been together for most of 43 years, and yet ours is a mixed marriage. She comes from a big, loud, boisterous family. Every Sunday they would all get together at her parents’ for dinner, watching ball games, and bragging about which daughter paid the least for her outfit. Once the nieces and nephews started coming along (she is youngest of six) there was a birthday to celebrate almost every week.
I am the younger of two, and by the time Rosemary and I started dating, my older sister was already away at college. So dinner was a quieter and more refined affair at the Erickson’s. My dad, extrovert and classical music and nature lover, was always trying to get Rosemary to sit and listen to his newest recording. Some were … an acquired taste. We will forever laugh about the Easter dinner when he insisted on playing his recording of rare bird calls.
So, what’s all this got to do with this month’s group writing topic of “cards?”
Greeting cards neatly summarize the different worlds that we came from. Her mom might send an occasional card to out-of-state relatives or friends, but to almost no one else. And no one else ever thought to send one. The operating principle was, and is, if you see someone every week, what is the point of sending a card? This casual approach extended to gift wrapping as well. One sister was a pioneer with a unique concept of “gift bags.” She would buy the gift, bring it home in the store bag, and toss the whole thing across the room to the recipient. “Happy Birthday!”
When we were married, Rosemary and I tried to adopt the tender tradition of sending greeting cards, but we soon gave up. There simply was no keeping up with my mom, who still sends valentine cards to our kids (ages 28, 30 and 31.) We would get the most arcane cards. You’d get a card in the mail, and then another one tucked into your birthday gift.
Rosemary is not a feminist, but after a while it did rankle a bit to always receive cards “to son and his wife.” We became 
suspicious when we started getting uncannily specific cards, like, “To our son and his wife on your 13th anniversary.” Where do you find a card like that? That’s when we discovered that she using some greeting card software program.
Another technological “advance” was adopted by my sister. I guess to save stamps and avoid tardiness, there is now a whole range of e-cards that you can send. Dear sis thinks it is clever to send me animated graphic cards of a bear playing happy birthday on the violin, accompanied by a rodent on piano. I have tried ignoring the e-mails announcing “so and so has sent you an e-card. Click on the link to see it!” You know they keep sending you reminders until you go open it? I sometimes feel guilty about not sending cards of the dead-tree variety, but my refusal to ever send an e-card is my way of standing athwart the treacly decline of our culture yelling “Stop!”
I think Rosemary would have been more open to joining the greeting card arms race if we had ever, just once, received a card “to daughter-in-law and her husband.”
Published in Group Writing
Thank you cards are why I didn’t have baby showers for the last 4 children. I’d rather get nothing than send out cards.
I laughed at that. My mother doesn’t send daughter-in-law cards. She sends cards that just say daughter. My wife is happy.
This is an entry in our Group Writing Series. Our theme for October is cards. In November, our theme will be “Novel.” If you have ever encountered something novel or something called a novel that you would like to write about, our sign-up sheet is here.
As a guy, I have always found all manner of “showers” (wedding, baby, divorce or what have you) to be tedious at best. If you thank someone as they hand you a gift, sending a card does seem redundant redundant.
Just today, she gave them all Halloween cards!
I love cards. I send cards. I think cards are much better to receive in the mail than bills or grocery circulars.
I prefer hand written cards over e-cards because they take more effort, but I don’t think thank you cards are necessary if you’ve thanked someone in person. They are a nice touch, however, if you have gotten a lot of gifts all at once to open because they show you noticed someone took the time and energy to think of you, even in the midst of plenty.
Thank you cards are essential if you got a gift in the mail because this lets the person who sent that gift know that you received it without them having to ask, “A-hem… Did you get that thing-y-bopper that I packaged up for you and stood in line for twenty minutes to send???” which can be awkward and make them feel like they are fishing for congratulations or something when all they really want to do is make sure the post didn’t lose it.
Mothers-in-law are special creatures. They really love their boys, but they try with those boys’ wives when they include them at all on the card.
I wish that I still had my mother-in-law around, though I didn’t appreciate her when she was living. In truth, she liked her grandchildren better than even the boy she birthed whom I married and most certainly more than that said boy’s wife. (Would “son’s wife who gave birth to the people who are actually loved most” be on a card?)
I bet the bird recordings were a hoot. :)
My folks had a record of whale sounds… no joke. Thankfully they never insisted on playing it for my significant other. Although, had it occurred to them at the time, I wouldn’t put it above them to prank any one of us kids by letting humpback whales serenade our high school girlfriends.
So in this arms race, what is the nuke card?
Pun intended?
Not sure. We do adhere to the MAD doctrine, though (Mom Always Delivers.)
Hey! I’d have loved your dad. And I’ll bet I’d have IDed a couple of those birds :)