Turtle Night Light

While we were visiting family over Thanksgiving, C's mom, whom I'm going to start calling Yetta (this is the name she has her grandchildren call her, and in case you were wondering, no we're not Jewish.), gave Wild Man a book; she does this frequently, and she always chooses beautifully illustrated books and often goes out of her way to attend author signings and always writes something to Wild Man in the book. I love books, so I treasure any book she gives him. I do put most of them away until I think he can really appreciate them, but we often take them out and read them to him. We do not, however, let him play with these particular books. When C showed me the book, he immediately showed me that it was signed by the author. I said something like "Oh, how cool. We have to be sure to put this in a place where Wild Man can't get to it." Yetta, who was in the room, said "Just be sure not to exchange it like you did that turtle night light I gave you at your wedding shower." I was so taken aback that I quickly responded "We never exchange books unless they are books we already have, and I don't exchange things unless I tell the person who has given me the gift." It didn't occur to me to respond to the implicit accusation in her statement; I was more concerned with reassuring her that I would never return anything so special. I promptly forgot about the statement until it came back to me yesterday while washing dishes. I suddenly recalled the statement and turned to C and asked "Did your mom really say that?" He burst into laughter at the randomness of my question, but he said she did, in fact, ask that question. He said she had mentioned it to him separately during the visit and he had to ask her what the hell she was talking about.

Here is what the hell she was talking about. In the month before C and I got married some 7 (yes, that's right 7) years ago, Yetta's friends (whom I had never met) threw me a wedding shower. Yetta gave me a very nice gift basket, which included a linen handkerchief embroidered with the date of the wedding and my initials (well, my married initials; she ignored the fact that I was going to hyphenate my last name), some perfume, a pretty slip (yes, it was weird to get lingerie from my future mother-in-law), and some body lotion. She also gave me a turtle night light as a separate gift. It looked something like this, but it was much brighter and much uglier. I had seen the light before on shopping trips with her, so I knew it was inexpensive and that she had bought it at a Wal-Mart. She didn't spend more than $10 on it. I assumed at the time (and still assume) that she thought I'd like it because I have a turtle. Well she was wrong, so I asked her if I could exchange it for something C and I needed more than a night light. She said yes and didn't seem at all upset. And then out of the blue she brings it up over 7 years later in connection to a gift she got for Wild Man. As I said, I didn't respond to the statement at the time because I was more focused on the book, but I really want to call her and say "What was that about?" Has it really bothered her for 7 years, or did she suddenly remember it? Am I really expected to keep a gift that I don't like and won't use to make her happy? Isn't it better that I politely asked her if I could return it for something I thought would be more useful (I have no idea what I exchanged it for--it was 7 years ago!)? Or is this simply another example of my ungratefulness? I have no idea what to think.

I am, however, seriously tempted to buy her a turtle night light for Christmas and see what she does with it . . .