The Last Gift

The Last Gift
By Rachael Heade

When I was about five years old I met my Aunt Nettie. She came all the way from New York (which was mentioned to all the adults several times each day). I gathered from these snatches of conversation that it was a long way away, and not an easy trip for a woman to make to see her sister. Her sister was my grandmother. In all there were four sisters, but I think it was against the law in California to have more than three of them in the state at the same time. So, on this occasion it was Nettie who had come to visit.

I’m not sure how it was that we came to be sitting together on the red cement steps that led to the terrace that was over the garage of our house. But there we sat, and she introduced me to the pistachio nut. She showed me how to split the shell with my thumbs and pull the nut out. I marveled at the way our finger tips turned red as we ate the sweet green nuts. I can’t remember much of what she said, but I remember her voice as something like I’d never heard before (and I’d heard quite a bit by the time I was five). If I were making a recipe for it, it would call for five parts Bronx accent and five parts Camel cigarettes and so much love that it became a warm and immediately comforting sound. She was one of those people who always followed your name with the word “darling”, and she meant it. You just knew she did even if she were chiding you for something.

We always kept in touch. Through all the years of my going from little girl to young woman. I always sent her birthday cards. Eventually the cards became bouquets of flowers as I moved into the working world and could afford to splurge on this tiny redheaded firecracker who still lived in the Bronx. And she would call me and thank me by telling me that “They’re so huge it looks like they should be in the lobby of the Ritz.” One year they were so huge she had to move them into the outer hallway of her apartment (personally, I think this was to impress the daughter-in-law). So, one year I opted for a potted bulb garden thinking it would at least be smaller. Of course, this created other difficulties which included having to water it and find a place to plant it. Didn’t I know that the daughter-in-law had paved Nettie’s garden area for her car?

Then a few year’s ago I decided to go back to my Jewish roots and send her something useful. So, I drove out to the mall and poked around in the lingerie department looking for a “house coat”. Unfortunately, finding a house coat is not as difficult as one would hope. I bought one in pink with some smocking at the neck and lace at the hem and cuffs. It had a zipper so she wouldn’t have to deal with buttons and I picked out a matching pair of house slippers. Feeling quite satisfied with myself, and my clever approach to evading the ever evolving problems with flowers I left the store. I sent the package off with a perfect card and waited for my thank you call. It came about four days later. “Rachael, darling, I got the robe and slippers. “Oh great, I said” my voice cheerful and thinking “Yeah, I did it.” And then, “Rachael, darling, who did you get this for, a giant? The robe is huge (at this point I’m beginning to think that anything I send to New York doubles in size automatically). I tell her it’s no problem that the store I bought it at is affiliated with Macy’s and she can take it back and get what she wants. I hang up believing all is right with the world.

Three days later I get a phone call. “Rachael, darling, it’s Aunt Nettie. “Hi, I say”. And then it comes. After two cabs, three trains and one snotty salesgirl my Aunt Nettie is still in possession of the giant’s robe. I can’t tell if I’m more upset that they didn’t take it back, or that the salesgirl told my Aunt Nettie that she was crazy for thinking they would. I ask her if she wants to send it back to me and I’ll get her another one, but she tells me that is too much trouble, maybe she can use it as a slipcover for her ottoman.

Not to be outsmarted by some little New York salesgirl I ring up the department store affiliate here in Seattle where I originally bought the robe. I explain the story to the Manager and as unbelievable as it sounds he agrees that it is indeed too difficult to ask an eighty-nine year old woman to pack up a robe and send it to them for a refund. And so he says to me, “We’ll just send her a check so she can buy whatever she wants.” Not a gift certificate, but a check. I am stunned. I think to myself he is the first person in the history of the world to actually solve a problem involving a poorly chosen gift and an eighty-nine year old Jewish woman. I call my Aunt Nettie and tell her the good news. She says she’ll believe it when the check arrives. Silently, I wonder if the check will double when it gets to New York.

A few days later I call my Aunt Nettie to see if the check arrived. She tells me it has and that she was able to buy some new burners for her stove with the money, and interestingly enough she was able to get the woman down the street to make some alterations to the robe so she can use it after all.

This was the last gift I bought for my Aunt Nettie as she died the following year, but she continues to give to me through my memories of her. And, whenever I think of her my love doubles in size.