Released: November 29, 2007

Talking about regifting

Source: Michelle Singletary, Washington Post (Free Registration)

I can’t let the holiday season go by without talking about regifting. To regift is to give someone something you were given but didn’t want or couldn’t use. I’ve been a regifter for years, long before it became hip—and controversial. I learned to regift from my grandmother, Big Mama, who raised my brothers and sisters and me.

There were many Christmases when Big Mama would place oranges, apples, tangerines and nuts on the different piles of presents she arranged for my siblings and me. She added the fruit and nuts to make our stacks seem larger.

It was tough for Big Mama on her low salary to buy a lot of gifts for the five of us. As we got older, we never let on that we knew the fruit and nuts had been regifted from the holiday bowls set out on the living room table.

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