Five Reasons The Hattie Became The Only Present I Give

A note from a reader who goes back every December for the library Christmas morning tea, and this year knew what to take before she had sat down with a pen.

I am 64, and every year since I retired I have gone back to the library for the staff Christmas morning tea on the second Friday in December. I take a plate of something and a small present for each of the women I sat beside at the reference desk for the best part of twenty years. Joy, Lorraine, Maureen, who left two years before me and still comes, and my sister Christine, who is not a librarian but has never missed a morning tea she could invite herself to.

Every year I agonise. This year I did not. I had already bought a little heart on a cord called the Hattie from The Mount Coastal Boutique, a small New Zealand boutique I buy my dresses from, and I had worn it every day since. So I ordered more of them. Here is why it became the only present I give.

Two of them on the bench the morning the courier came, and the little box Joy's went into.

What it is

One small flat heart in a soft, worn silver colour, matte rather than shiny, threaded onto a tan double cord through a slot in the middle. No clasp. Two sliding knots let it out to go over the hand and pull it in to sit on the wrist. It opens up to 22.8 centimetres, and there is one size.

The five reasons

1. There is no clasp.Joy did the returns trolley for thirty years and her fingers have opinions about small catches now. I have watched her give up on a necklace at the staff room table. The Hattie slides over the hand and pulls snug with the two knots, and that is the whole of it. Joy, when I showed her mine in October: "No clasp? Then I can wear it." That was the first one ordered.
2. There is no size to get wrong.Christine is 67 and I have never once bought her the right size in anything, rings included. This one opens to 22.8 centimetres and pulls in as small as you like. I asked Susan at the boutique before I ordered, because Christine has a larger hand than me, and she wrote back the same day to say it would be plenty. Christine: "If it is another scarf, Wendy, I am giving it to the raffle."
3. It goes with every colour she owns.Lorraine wears colour the way other women wear navy, cobalt one day and fuchsia the next. Tan goes with all of it, and the matte silver colour does not fight with a watch or a ring. It is the one piece of jewellery I could buy her without knowing what she will wear on the day. Lorraine, at the last morning tea, in orange and pink: "I do not own anything that goes with anything." She will now.
4. It does not clatter.Maureen is 71 and walks with me on Tuesdays, and she cannot bear anything that jingles. The Hattie weighs nothing and taps nothing. It is quiet, which in a library is still the highest compliment there is. Maureen, on the walk: "You keep touching it." I do.
5. It costs what a present should.$42.95 at the moment, from $89.95, and less again when you take more than one, because the stack discount comes off in the cart. Four of them came to less than the one good scarf I bought Christine three Christmases ago, which she gave to the raffle. Graeme, reading over my shoulder: "Four? For under the scarf?" Yes.

Maureen's, ready under the tree. Graeme says November is too early for the tree. Graeme is outvoted.

Side by side, honestly

Presents I used to give	The Hattie
A scarf she gives to the raffle	A bracelet she wears every day
A ring in a size I guessed	One size, opens to 22.8 centimetres
A chain with a clasp for small fingers	No clasp, two sliding knots
Something that jingles on the desk	Matte, quiet, weighs nothing
Bought in a panic on the twentieth	Ordered in October, wrapped in November

On the library book I have had out far too long, next to Lorraine's parcel. Old habits.

The honest bit

It is small. If the woman on your list likes a piece that catches the light from across the room, this is not that. The cord comes in tan only. And it is a quiet present, which is what I wanted, but it will not make anyone gasp. It will make them put it on and leave it on.

What I would tell you if we were friends

If it is for Christmas, order by Friday 4 December. It comes by NZ Post in seven to ten working days, usually, and thirty days to change your mind. That gets it to you in time to wrap with a week to spare. Buy one for yourself while you are there. I did, in October, and it has not come off.

If you have a morning tea, a book club or a sister you never get right, you already know who these are for.

— Wendy