But then the money business began. You like to give a girl presents when you're in love — you like to do things right. Well, Lord knows, Eva was no gold-digger — she was as likely to be pleased with a soda as a pair of imported gloves. On the other hand, she was as likely to be pleased with the gloves.

To be loved means to be recognized as existing.

Need-love cries to God from our poverty; Gift-love longs to serve, or even to suffer for, God; Appreciative love says: “We give thanks to thee for thy great glory.” Need-love says of a woman “I cannot live without her”; Gift-love longs to give her happiness, comfort, protection – if possible, wealth; Appreciative love gazes and holds its breath and is silent, rejoices that such a wonder should exist even if not for him, will not be wholly dejected by losing her, would rather have it so than never to have seen her at all.” p.17

Love is by definition an unmerited gift; being loved without meriting it is the very proof of real love. If a woman tells me: I love you because you're intelligent, because you're decent, because you buy me gifts, because you don't chase women, because you do the dishes, then I'm disappointed; such love seems a rather self-interested business. How much finer it is to hear: I'm crazy about you even though you're neither intelligent nor decent, even though you're a liar, an egotist, a bastard.

Sometimes, when you are not getting the love you want, giving makes you think you will.

She only felt that the candle would burn better, the packing go easier, the world be happier, if she could give and receive some human love.

Some people are gift givers by nature. They love their tribe, or they respect their art, and so they give. Not for an ulterior motive, but because it gives them joy.

I like not only to be loved, but also to be told that I am loved. I am not sure that you are of the same mind. But the realm of silence is large enough beyond the grave. This is the world of light and speech, and I shall take leave to tell you that you are very dear.

My mother was pulling my leg on that one. I have collected so much gift-wrapped trash over the years from people who copped out and hurriedly bought a little plastic cheapie to give under the protective flag of good thoughts. I tell you, it is the gift that counts. Or rather, people who think good thoughts give good gifts. It ought to be a rule — the Brass Rule of Gift Exchange.

To know that people care about how you’re doing when the doing isn’t so good, that’s what love is.

And when it is a gift, when it is honest, she recognizes and appreciates a man who genuinely appreciates her. These men are rare. Women are people too (radical idea, I know). And as people, we all value those who genuinely value us, not expecting something in return.

I can honestly say that every gift I’ve ever given has brought at least as much happiness to me as it has to the person I’ve given it to. I give as I feel. Throughout the year, that may mean mailing a handwritten note to someone who didn’t expect it. Or sending a great new lotion I just discovered, or delivering a book of poetry with a pretty bow. It doesn’t matter what the thing is; what matters is how much of yourself goes into the giving, so that when the gift is gone, the spirit of you lingers.

You are loved. If so, what else matters?

The great art of giving consists in this the gift should cost very little and yet be greatly coveted, so that it may be the more highly appreciated.