MMA Magazine Madness
I was dating a guy for a few months when Christmas rolled around. He had recently started a new job that required him to travel. This was before smartphones and cars had built-in GPS, so I splurged a bit and got him a navigation system to help him find his way. Thoughtful, practical, but not too sentimental; it felt perfect for where the relationship was at the time.
Due to our schedules, we couldn’t get together until a few days after Christmas. In my haste to go see him, I walked right out the door without his gift. I didn’t realize it until I got to his house, and I felt terrible, but he said, “No worries, I’ll give you your gifts now, and I’ll just get mine later.” Cool. So he went into the other room and came back with two wrapped gifts.
I noticed some of the paper was messed up as if it had been rewrapped, but I didn’t think much of it at the moment. I carefully unwrapped the first package. It was an MMA magazine—that had clearly been read. I was confused. I did not like MMA. Not even a little bit. Nor have I ever expressed interest in MMA. Not once. He, on the other hand, loved all things MMA.
Trying to move on, I politely thanked him, set the magazine down, and refocused on the next gift. It was even more bizarre. From the shape of the package, I could tell it was a DVD. It was a Forrest Gump DVD—with the cellophane wrapper missing. Forrest Gump is a solid choice, except I already owned a Forrest Gump DVD. Now here I was suddenly the proud owner of a second copy that appeared to be used.
I thanked him again and sat there quietly, trying to wrap my head around how he could have arrived at the conclusion that a used magazine on a topic I didn’t like, and a secondhand DVD of something I already owned would make for good Christmas gifts. He got a little quiet, then sheepishly volunteered, “I, uh, got bored, so I watched the movie yesterday.”
I just stared at him. He continued, “And then I, uh, hadn’t seen that issue yet…so I went ahead and read through it. I think you’ll really like it!” I slowly responded, “So, you got me a magazine because you wanted to read it and then watched the movie you got for me because you were bored?” His only response was, “Well yeah, I guess so.” I left shortly after that.
The next day, I returned the GPS system for a full refund. About a week later, he called and said he didn’t think it was working out. “No problem,” I said, “I don’t think it’s working out either.” But it wasn’t over yet. As we were wrapping up the call, expressing well wishes and all that, he paused for a beat and said, “Hey, uh, were you still going to give me that Christmas present?” ~ beehaw7