Everyone knows the plot of the short story “The Gift of the Magi” by O. Henry: Wife cuts off and sells her beautiful hair in order to buy a platinum chain for her husband’s prized watch, which he sells in order to buy his wife a set of tortoise shell combs. The end result is that their gifts are mutually useless. She cannot wear her combs without her hair, and he cannot use his watch chain without his watch.
The last paragraph of the story compares the hapless couple to the magi, the “wonderfully wise men who brought gifts to the Babe in the manger,” because the couple smiles and shrugs at the loss of their treasures. They are content because they know that their love is the greatest treasure. The last lines of the story are poorly punctuated, but nonetheless sublime: “But in a last word to the wise of these days let it be said that of all who give gifts these two were the wisest. Oh all who give and receive gifts, such as they are wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the magi.”
Conventional wisdom holds that the moral of “The Gift of the Magi” is that the exchange of material objects isn’t as important as the realization that love is the most precious possession. I say, the moral of “The Gift of the Magi” is that you should always ask your loved one what he wants for Christmas. Don’t aim too high. And above all, be practical. If he can’t feel the love emanating out of a package of Hanes Tagless Boxer Briefs with ComfortSoft Waistbands, then romance is a lost cause anyway.
