Sheila Sims Iding
That’s a good title and an even better question. What DO you give your son for his first wedding shower gift? Well first you give him the courage to say “yes” when an “aunt” invites him to the shower your friends are throwing. You know it’s not a couples’ shower and you know it’s all women. And you know it’s tricky to say yes to that special invitation. Even the bride-to-be is a bit apprehensive because it’s YOUR friends and everyone will be watching HER open the gifts. So the first thing your son will need before even opening a gift is the courage to say “yes” to sitting with over 20 women and be showered.
After the “yes” to the invitation, you are selfishly glad because you will get to share this first wedding shower with him. It will be fun to watch from this side of the playing field. I’ve been on the planning of several showers, the hosting of several showers and even the cooking on several showers. But I never got to be the “mom”…until Saturday. So it was special to know that Joey was going to be one of the girls…at least for that afternoon.
So after the “yes” and the selfishly glad feeling…you think about how he will be opening the gift you picked out for Addie last January. Yes….almost 10 months ago I got her this gift. I was so excited for it to be the first shower gift from me to her. A new travel cosmetic bag from Potterybarn with her new initials on it. A-I-A monogrammed so pretty on the front…but tucked inside was another little bag and tucked in that was the Tiffany bracelet with her new initials A-I-A engraved forever. Wouldn’t Joey love watching her open that?
As I envisioned that I realized that the gift was solely for her. Not the expresso coffee maker they could share, or the lanterns she loved but they both would enjoy or the crystal cake plate for grandma’s famous banana cake with caramel frosting. Even Joey would enjoy that. But this gift I got for Addie was solely for her…not that it mattered but he wouldn’t have anything from his mom to open up. What’s a mother to do? At 4:00 a.m. on the morning of shower, what do you give your son for a wedding shower gift?
Well there is some purpose to tossing and turning and trying to solve problems when you can’t sleep…sometimes…just sometimes…the answers come flying into your head…into your heart. And you remember…the treasures you had saved, the keepsakes you kept, the memories you tucked away for a special occasion. Surely, a first wedding shower is a special occasion. Surely a son getting married warrants going through that treasure box (okay…boxes) in the basement. So at 4:30 a.m. on Saturday morning…I went shopping…paying no attention to the spiders or…even worse…the centipedes I may encountered…on my shopping spree.
The first box held the treasure. I didn’t see it right away. When you open the box you see Grandpa Joe’s hats. How dapper were those hats? I saved them for my sons. But how does that go with a wedding shower? Digging a bit deeper, I found it. Grandpa Joe’s leather briefcase with his initials. Joe Iding’s briefcase would be the perfect gift for Joey Iding.
So I opened it up and inside were all the special papers from Fr. Brian Barrons’ ordination. Fr. Brian. Joey’s Godfather. There was the program, the prayer cards, the quotations. All there in his Grandpa’s briefcase. Grandpa Joe had been a proud attendant of that special day at Maryknoll in May, 1984. He had tucked the keepsakes in the briefcase that would now become it’s own keepsake.
Perfect. Fr. Brian is more than Joey’s Godfather. He is the priest who will marry Joey and his beloved Addie. He will come home from China to be the one to perform the sacred sacrament of Matrimony. And framing the special quote from his “uncle” Brian’s ordination will be the perfect gift to go with the briefcase.
So blessed to have two such special men in his life…Grandpa Joe and Brian. But wait! He is even more blessed. He had a special papa (my dad) and his own father. Four special men in his life. So now at 5:00 a.m. I am on the hunt for a gift from papa and Pat. So I head to the family room bookshelves for more “shopping”. I have a whole shelf of books that were my father’s when he was a little boy. I love the way the old books look on that shelf. Saturday morning I loved that one of them would become a shower gift for Joey. I carefully looked at each worn cover and the inside browned pages. There I found the name “Lorne Sims”. It was a book about a baseball player. It was perfect.
Then just across the fireplace are more books and books and books and there was a poem book that used to be Pat’s. Inside was the inscription: “Merry Christmas, Pat. Love, mom and dad” Christmas 1962. Shopping complete and now time to wrap these shower gifts…the treasures. I wrapped the 3 smaller gifts and put them into the briefcase which was also wrapped and now destined to be his wedding shower gift.
As he and Addie took their places on the “thrones”…the two chairs placed side by side for gift opening…they handed him the present. He read the little gift card which said. “To Jacques: You were brave enough to come to a women’s shower because of the strong men in your life. Love you so, mom.
Then he opened each gift. He took the paper off his grandfather’s briefcase and read the tag attached to it which said “Your Grandpa Joe taught you work ethics and the importance of hard work.”
The tag on papa’s baseball book said “Papa gave you your love of sports and the determination to beat the odds.”
The tag on Pat’s book said “May your father’s Christmas gift remind you of your love of Christmas and how God sent His love on that day.”
The tag on his Godfather’s quote said: ‘Uncle Brian was with your dad the day you were diagnosed. His prayers have been unceasing.”
As he carefully placed each one back in “his” briefcase, the gift was now complete. So…what do you give your son for a wedding shower gift? You give him a reminder of the four amazing men that God has blessed his life with. You give him a reminder of the importance of hard work; the raw strength of determination; the awe of God’s greatest gift; and power of unceasing prayer. And you realize that you didn’t give him anything at all. God had blessed his life years before this shower. Actually…years before his birth.. God had put in place four amazing gifts. I didn’t get him anything for that shower because God had already done the “shopping.”