There are times I’m happy hand over my hard-earned to friends and family. When things have become unpleasantly tight and a big payment is due. When I feel like shouting lunch. When they are under 10 years old, and $10 in a birthday card is a seriously big deal.
Hell, call me an enabler, but I’ve even handed over a lazy $50 at the pub when the ATM is down.
But there are times when I’m not inclined to hand over my money. And a baby shower is one of them.
I simply cannot get my head around this new trend: the ‘silent baby shower’.
It works like this: ‘guests’ (and I use the term in the loosest possible way) are sent an invitation to celebrate the imminent arrival of a gorgeous little bundle of joy. But they don’t have to go anywhere. There is no gathering.
What they do have to do is send money. Moolah for the parents-to-be. The invitation is explicit in its intent. No presents of the unwrapping kind.
Just cash.
There's a very large scream in my head and it's saying 'Where are your manners!!!"
A slightly smaller scream is saying 'It would never have happened in our day'. And I've never been more certain about that.
Back in the olden days, this is how a baby shower was done: A sister, mother-in-law or close friend bought a standard pack of invitations from the newsagency. They probably featured a stork with a baby-filled bundle in its beak. In real life the weight would have sent the bird plummeting to earth. But in real life, a stork doesn't actually deliver the baby. Hey-ho.