When you have kids, it’s inevitable that they will have friends. And it’s inevitable that those friends will have birthdays and thus birthday parties. Between pre-school and dance class and all her other after-school activities, my five year old daughter Camille has several hundred “best friends”. So Camille does a lot of birthday parties and thus, so does her daddy. I often find myself realizing about ten minutes before we are to leave for a party that I completely forgot to get a gift. Gifts are not optional. So last week I was quite proud of myself when I bought the gift during the week actually several days in advance.

So no need to stress this time. I’ve got everything under control– so I thought until about five minutes before we needed to leave for the party. I never gift wrapped the present and had no “acceptable gift wrapping paper in the house. Life is all about how you market everything, so I thought long and hard about how I was going to sell Camille on the wonderful fact that there would not be any wrapping paper. Will she even notice? If she does, let her know that daddy is saving the environment. Why should a tree die for often cranky, spoiled Amanda? Who needs the extra garbage? We are saving the planet.

As we’re leaving for the party with a Barbie Princess in my hand, Camille scolds me, “Daddy, we forgot Amanda’s gift!”. “Camille, I have the gift right here in my hand.” “No, Daddy, you have a Barbie doll in your hand. You forgot to gift wrap it. You have to gift wrap it.” No Cami sweetheart, I didn’t forget. I know how much you and Amanda love trees, and wrapping paper comes from trees. So we are saving a tree by not putting on wrapping paper, and this way Amanda and everyone else at the party gets to see right away what you got for her.” Camille was pissed. She got her “you’ve got to be the stupidest father in the world face on” and just stared at me. Since, in general, Camille thinks I have a limited intelligence, she often explains things to me in analogies. “Daddy, given a present without gift wrapping it is like playing with a Barbie dolls without any Barbie clothing. It’s boring and no fun.” I shot back, “Camille, gifts are like people, they are never as fun as you want them to be!” “Daddy, gifts are like people, they don’t want to be ugly. My gift wants some pretty wrapping paper.” O.K. I needed to change tactics.

“Camille, you know gift wrapping paper can be quite expensive?” “Papa’s right. He says you’re cheap. You’re cheap.” “Papa says I’m cheap? When did he say that? Just because I buy generic laundry detergent. It’s the same thing! Because I add a little bit of water to the Minute Maid Fruit Punch? It’s so sweet.”

“Gift wrapping takes about ten minutes as well and it never looks that great unless you’re a professional gift wrapper. If you think about the thousands of gifts you wrap in a lifetime, you are spending days if not weeks of your lifetime wrapping gifts, using paper that will only be shred apart as someone excitedly sees what’s underneath. If gift wrapping paper is so important, why don’t we just give out empty boxes as gifts. Isn’t it the thought that counts? Has the world just gotten that superficial?”

Nobody was listening to my rant. Camille had left for the party with Papa, who being French, had some Chinese silk that could be used as wrapping paper hidden under the bed. Amanda was getting a beautifully wrapped Barbie doll and guess who’s probably getting an empty box for Father’s Day!

Dr. Murray Trillionaire is a reknowned world expert with doctoral degrees in Yiddish Country Music from Brigham Young University and the History of Medieval New Jersey from the University of Atlantic City. He is the founder of the psychological school of thought commonly known as Trillionairism that believes that the answers to all of mankind’s problems can be found in the lyrics of pop songs from the 80s (particularly those from Culture Club). He is a tireless advocate of getting paper mache building recognized as an Olympic sport but is not sure if it should be part of the Summer or Winter Games. Get to know more about Murray by visiting his website www.murraytrillionaire.com.