A Father's Day Gift
There was excitement around the house as we were instructed by our mother to observe this event, Father's Day. What were we to do, we asked. "Why, buy a present for your father" she said. We checked our small purses, mine was red leather with a little green alligator embossed on the front and my sister's was blue with a more friendly white poodle embossed on the front.
My sister was ten and I was eight and we suddenly felt very responsible as we examined our wealth and tried to imagine the gift we would buy for our father. And so we went to the Dime Store in our neighborhood; Woolworth's Dime Store was truly a five and dime store long ago in the 1930's, with things like stationary and cards and tin toys and paper dolls; rubber balls and jump ropes and then a few items for kitchens and such. We walked back and forth, wondering if we would find the perfect present for our father when, there it was! A black enameled tin with a scene of a Japanese garden and little bridge painted on the cover. We opened it up and found a clamp to hold something in place. The saleslady explained that it was a case to hold cigarettes. Our father needed this case, we decided. How beautiful it was! We paid our saleslady a nickel from each of our purses and assured one another of our brilliant discovery.
Wrapped in white tissue paper with a brown polka ribbon (left over from some other important present), we could hardly wait for Father's Day to come. We thought we should have filled the case with the Camel cigarettes that our father smoked; our mother said that the beautiful case was enough. We loved hearing our father praise the case and then he opened his package of Camel Cigarettes and shook out the cigarettes, carefully, he said, so that none of the tobacco was loosened, and placed them, one by one, into the case and then, with the satisfaction of someone who has just been given the one gift they had always wanted (cigarettes being messy in the package, he said) he slipped the beautiful cigarette case with the exotic Japanese picture on its cover, into his coat pocket.
We were satisfied that we had given our father the most wonderful of presents for this Father's Day. We always asked him if he had his cigarettes with him when he went off to work. He always did.
My sister was ten and I was eight and we suddenly felt very responsible as we examined our wealth and tried to imagine the gift we would buy for our father. And so we went to the Dime Store in our neighborhood; Woolworth's Dime Store was truly a five and dime store long ago in the 1930's, with things like stationary and cards and tin toys and paper dolls; rubber balls and jump ropes and then a few items for kitchens and such. We walked back and forth, wondering if we would find the perfect present for our father when, there it was! A black enameled tin with a scene of a Japanese garden and little bridge painted on the cover. We opened it up and found a clamp to hold something in place. The saleslady explained that it was a case to hold cigarettes. Our father needed this case, we decided. How beautiful it was! We paid our saleslady a nickel from each of our purses and assured one another of our brilliant discovery.
Wrapped in white tissue paper with a brown polka ribbon (left over from some other important present), we could hardly wait for Father's Day to come. We thought we should have filled the case with the Camel cigarettes that our father smoked; our mother said that the beautiful case was enough. We loved hearing our father praise the case and then he opened his package of Camel Cigarettes and shook out the cigarettes, carefully, he said, so that none of the tobacco was loosened, and placed them, one by one, into the case and then, with the satisfaction of someone who has just been given the one gift they had always wanted (cigarettes being messy in the package, he said) he slipped the beautiful cigarette case with the exotic Japanese picture on its cover, into his coat pocket.
We were satisfied that we had given our father the most wonderful of presents for this Father's Day. We always asked him if he had his cigarettes with him when he went off to work. He always did.
posted by your faithful correspondent at
5:21 PM
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