If you sent the book and she didn’t bother to thank you, would you be hurt? If you’re okay with your nice gesture being ignored, then send it.
I don’t think it’s “creepy”, but if someone I had a falling out with sent me something out of the blue, I might be annoyed.
Okay, now that I know the book and the book’s title, I think it would be highly unlikely that she would take it in a weird way, and your gift would be a rather thoughtful (and adorable, IMO.) If it were me, I would be happy to receive something like that no matter who I got it from. I’m not saying she’ll necessarily respond positively, but that wouldn’t be your problem, it would be hers.
I don’t think I’d be annoyed, more like surprised. And yes, I would feel obligated to send a thank you note. Whether this resulted in a rekindling of the friendship would likely depend on whether I wanted to rekindle it, but I wouldn’t feel obligated to do so.
Nah. I’d wonder if the book ever completed the journey, but that’s about it.
The one is definitely “Reach for…” but the other could be “Under the North Star” (I can’t remember which is which). The brown book is at my sister’s now I think. Maybe they list the whole series in the front cover or something, I should check. One of the two has a few short poems by Tennyson too. Ever since I got that I do stop and take a look at old school readers when I find them in used bookshops. They can be a treasure trove of fun stuff.
Not romantic? God, I am so bad at this…
Missed the edit window:
As for a “thank you” note. This is going to a person who only very rarely acknowledges ever getting anything at all even when you’re on good terms, so I wouldn’t expect one anyway.
Look at it this way: it’s all good karma, thank you note received or not.
I love old school readers, but what gets me about them is how kids these days are less literate because most schools no longer use readers, let alone ones that have Tennyson poems in them.
Wut? What do they use then?
In the schools around here, oral reading has been banned because some kids might not read as well as others, and they wouldn’t want the ones who don’t read so well to be made fun of by the others.
It’s more of that touchy-feely bullsh*t that seems to be rampant in the school system these days.
So, no readers anymore. No phonics either; it’s been jettisoned in favour of something called “sight words”.
All taken together, it’s no wonder Johnny can’t read.
Okay, I’ve decided: no, not going to send the book. I figure if I’m not totally comfortable with how it may be received then my gut is telling me something. So, I’ll go with my gut instinct.
I’ll hang onto it for now, in case things change, but for the time being, it will just stay on our shelves. It’s possible I’ll hear from this old (former) friend nearer my wedding day (unlikely, but possible), so I can broach the subject then.
Do you have a friend in common that you can give the book to so they can pass it along? Then common friend can say “Swallowed My Cellphone saw this book and remembered you saying you wanted it. It wasn’t very expensive, so he picked it up for you. He didn’t want it to be a big deal, so he asked me to pass it on.”
Or the common friend can say they found the book and wondered if she might be interested in it. This idea takes you out of the loop completely and she gets the book she wanted.
Would the post office let you mail it without a return address. Then you send it anonymously.
One of my pathologies is I buy gifts for people. It makes me happy. I like doing it.
Women find it creepy as heck. They spend too much time watching Action Nine News at Nine and stories about axe murderers.
As usual, Cat Fight is right.
Axe murderers buy people gifts before they axe murder them? Didn’t know that…I guess they’re not all bad.
Band-Aids, probably.
Why not just send it anonymously?
Now that would creep me out. Receiving a gift anonymously, I’d be trying to figure out who sent it. Looking at the postmark, etc.
I’m disappointed that you don’t want to send it now. I think that would be a cool thing to do.
Just copy and paste Cat Fight’s post into your word processor and print it out.
I think what’s bugging my gut is that, for whatever reason, I’m remembering a trivial thing she said twenty years ago. So something about acting on that now just pings my own creep-o-meter. Not that I think I’m creepy. In fact, I think I’m a righteous dude. But I’ve always been the kind of guy who worries about making other people feel uncomfortable.
I can keep it on a shelf and wait. If a less creepy-feeling opportunity comes up to pass it along, via a third party ( as pudytat suggested) or if she stops being Little Miss Grumpy Pants or whatever, then that’s cool. It’s not like there’s any hurry. It hasn’t killed her to miss out on the book up until now, after all.
That would definitely be creepy.