I know that I have written a few posts about my birthday, but well here is another one! One of my friends gave me an extremely thoughtful minimalist gift that I thought was a great example to write about. Let me explain. In a gift bag, she handed me a variety of my favourite gluten and dairy free treats and snack foods as well as a card. Inside the card there was a note and some money stating that this was money to rent a movie from a video store to have a night in eating delicious snacks.
The idea being she handed me a bag full of consumables as well as the experience of renting a DVD that I could borrow and then return was certainly a minimalist gift. As none of these items would end ups as dust gatherers on a shelf.
This gift was also an experience within itself as this was designed to be a novelty. For most the days of going to the movie store on a Friday night to rent a movie are long gone as a result of streaming services such as Netflix. But one thing I will say was that I genuinely enjoyed going to the video store with my boyfriend, wandering around and choosing a movie. We were there foe a while, discussion, browsing and remembering the days when we used to dot his all the time. It was then nice to come home, settle in with my favourite foods and enjoy a movie we returned later that evening.
My friend gave me the gift of an experience and time. My boyfriend and I enjoyed a date night and this resulted in us spending quality time together doing soothing we wouldn’t normally do. The whole experience was rather nostalgic and took be me back to my childhood days when my Gran used to take us grand kids to the video store all the time where we’d browse for what seemed like hours and fight over what movies we were going to rent out. My other half also talked about his childhood recollections of renting movies and when I’ve mentioned this gift to others it’s conjured similar stories from them as well.
I was extremely touched my friend put a great deal of thought into her gift and as a result it really meant a lot to me. Not only the gift itself but the meaning and discussion it evoked with other people around me. A gift that is able to bring such discussion and emotion from other people is certainly not just useless ‘stuff’. Sometimes the gift of an experience is the best sort of gift.
I look back on this experience with fond memories of the past and the reminders it brought me. I am forever grateful for this gift and who knows, maybe the video store isn’t dead after all. Maybe the concept will make a retro come back. Who knows. One thing I do know is, that I might actually go back again.
What experience gifts have you received? What were your experiences of going to a video store?
This is Minimalism 