Thank you for the gift, whatever it was
Lori Clinch
Are We There Yet?

Thank you cards. I get sick just thinking about them. Although my saying so may make me look bad in the eyes of the etiquette police (and I'm sure it's enough to make Ms. Manners choke on her crumpet), I wish the darned tradition of sending them had never been started.

They've caused me nothing but stress. For instance, what does one do if one's son graduates from high school, receives a boatload of gifts and cash prizes and does a poor job with his thank-you cards? Something like that is bound to make a mother look bad. It's enough to make people wonder if she did a poor job rearing her child. Had she not taken the time to teach him etiquette? Has he no fear of a faux pas?

Now I must say that our dear Vernon has been a stellar teenager. He's quick with a smile, remembers his mother on Mother's Day and occasionally shows up for dinner. Although he doesn't appreciate my laundry skills and disses my sock-mating abilities, he's been quite tolerable.

After his graduation party, I watched intently as Vernon opened his cards and gifts. I made a list and checked it twice. I wrote down cash amounts, documented the shower caddies, and described the picture frames in careful detail.

I let Vernon have a couple of days to rest before I plunked a large box of thank-you cards down on his lap. "Vernon," I said as I tried to shake him out of his graduated slumber, "it's time to get these done."

"Can't you do it for me?" he asked with all the independence that his 18 years would allow.

"No."

"But why?" he whined as he rolled over and placed an arm over his head.

"Because I refuse to write 'Thank you for giving my darling son a gift, he really appreciated it and will inscribe his own card of appreciation as soon as he grows up.'"

With that he rubbed his eyes and said, "That sounds good to me."

It wasn't until I told him that he couldn't use a gift or deposit a dime of the cash until the cards had been written that Vernon bolted out of the recliner and headed to the kitchen table.

Vernon worked long and hard and appeared to be taking time with each and every card. With the kitchen light shining bright above his head, Vernon burned the midnight oil.

When he finally completed his cards, he appeared before me with bags under his eyes and a kink in his neck. Feeling sorry for the little guy, I agreed to address the cards for him. In doing so, I couldn't help but notice the absence of some important names.

"Where are the Millers?" I asked Vernon as I again nudged him awake. "And where are my cousins, your grandma, and did no one think to mention Ella Mae?"

"I did everyone on the list," he said as he again rolled over and placed his arm over his head.

It took a bout of threats, a couple of curse words and intimidation tactics worthy of the militia, but I had Vernon back to the kitchen table in no time - writing and corresponding and as near as I could tell, being downright appreciative.

I mailed most of the cards on a Wednesday and met up with some of my sisters-in-law on Thursday and thought it might be a nice touch to deliver the cards to them in person.

It wasn't until they started chuckling that I realized that something had gone askew. "What is it?" I asked as I felt a lump forming in my throat.

"Well," said one fine and loving aunt, "Vernon thanked me for the cash, but I gave him a set of towels.

"Yes," said another, "he told me that my gift of $20 would come in handy next year at the university, but I gave him an alarm clock and a camping chair."

I had barely recovered from the humiliation when I received an e-mail from my good friend Trixie who had written to say, "We received Vernon's thank-you card today and laughed until we were sick."

I was so mad that I could have spit as I assumed that Vernon had thanked her for something that he didn't really receive. Although I didn't really want to know, I called her and asked what my darling son had written.

"Well," she said, "although we gave him a photo album and a gift card for a movie, your son wrote, 'Thank you for the laundry supplies. My mom will sure need them when I bring home a month's worth of dirty clothes.'"

I wonder what Ms. Manners would think of that.

Lori Clinch is the mother of four sons and the author of the book "Are We There Yet?" You can reach her at www.loriclinch.com.