A Gift of Art

I heard a knock at my door. I wasn’t expecting anyone. It was early evening and dark outside. I set down Anna Karenina and got up from the couch.

At my door were two neighbors from a few domiciles away, younger men, partners I think, but hard to tell. One was burly and bearded, the other lanky, wearing pink sneakers and pink highlights in Jesus-length hair. Quite the couple!

A few hours before, I had gifted them with two beaverwood walking sticks, and here they were…for what?

We had met months earlier, as they were strolling by and I was outside, sorting through my collection of beaverwood. They came over and I gave them the lowdown on the collection and my admiration for the beaver’s unique art-making abilities. They were positively ecstatic to learn about beavers and to hold beaverwood in their hands for the first time. I converted them on the spot

Then one of them asked if he could have a piece for a walking stick. The other wanted one, too.

But of course! Of course! I let them browse and they eventually chose two beauties that Moses would have been proud to part the Red Sea with.

Over the next few months, they wore out those sticks and asked if they could have new ones. Of course! They told me they loved walking with beaverwood staffs. They walked so much damn better!

At the door, the two men, presented me a gift that was a painting on a flat rock of a goofy beaver gnawing a piece of wood! Are you kidding me? They had painted it not long after I gave them the staffs and this was their extraordinary thanks.

I was truly dumbfounded and overjoyed. It was one of the nicest gestures of appreciation I have ever experienced in my life.