Greeting Cards

My wife had another birthday the other day. The number assigned to her existence remains a sensitive matter; a closely guarded secret.

As it happened, she was out of town on business, and forced to mark the occasion on her own. A glass of wine and some crab cakes in a hotel bar in New York.

But I telephoned her earlier in the day, and sent an e-mail. I wanted to send an e-card, too – something resembling what you see at right. But most e-cards, like most hard copy cards, are in extreme bad taste and totally inappropriate, as far as I'm concerned.

Maybe I've become an old fuddy-duddy. But I don't think so.

Nope. I think most greeting cards these days, or at least those you can find easily in your local drug store or grocery store, are tasteless beyond words. A lot of fart jokes, and black balloons jokes, and (for straight women) pictures of washboard-ab studs in leather – and everything that implies.

There are, of course, a few lines of tasteful cards on the market. Once my wife got home I gave her one of those blank cards with a pleasing scene from the natural world: in this case, two young trees intertwined.

But on the day itself I just sent an email, along with an old, scanned photo of the two of us. And all my love.