Ronda Rich

Syndicated Columnist

When brides stopped registering for china and crystal, making it less fun to shop for wedding gifts as well as much harder, I just started looking around my kitchen at what items I use the most.

I miss going to a department store, looking at all the pretty, sparkling things, then having them wrapped up nice and pretty.

Several years ago, our local Belk, from which I had bought many a bridal gift, stopped wrapping. I was stunned. Almost as stunned as the woman in customer service when I handed over the bag and asked her to, please, wrap it.

Free bridal wrapping falling to the wayside was a rude awakening.

I disliked wrapping – but trust me, I’m a Southern woman, so I was taught how to wrap and make pretty bows. Not by Mama.

Remember, she came from the mountains, so she used tiny pieces of masking tape for her gifts. And, if by terrible choice, she was out of masking tape, she used either black electrical or duct tape.

I’m not good enough, though, that I use two-sided tape on the folded edges. And it all depends on whether I have 30 minutes to hunt down all the paper and ribbon. If I don’t, then I fall back on one of life’s better inventions: a gift bag with tissue paper (sometimes reused tissue paper, to be truthful).

When we were recently invited to a Sunday afternoon shower for my niece’s son, I wanted the perfect gift. I put a great deal of thought in it. Especially since I was going to have to spend 20 minutes to wrap it.

A remembrance caught the edge of my memory.

When my niece, the mother of the groom, married, Mama spent weeks “seasoning” a new skillet she bought. We ate supper at Mama’s every Thursday and, more often than not, we had a big country breakfast for supper. One night, Mama pulled a pan of buttermilk biscuits from the oven, set them on the stove, then got a small dollop of bacon grease from the lidded jar, pulled out the second oven rack and dropped it into an empty skillet.

She looked up at me and smiled, as she used a pot holder to push the hot rack back into the oven.

“I’m seasonin’ a cast iron skillet for Nicole. Every newly married woman needs one.”

Nicole, with enough common sense to appreciate such a treasure, has proudly used it over the years. So, the bright idea came to me: ‘That’s it! I’ll get them an iron skillet.”

These days, most skillets come seasoned. Tennessee-based Lodge skillet company pre-seasons their pans and they even have Dolly Parton pans named after famous songs like Jolene.

I was very proud of myself, certain I had picked the perfect gift. Especially when I remembered that Nicole was so proud of hers.

To this day. And I took the time to wrap it beautifully. I was proud of the perfectly selected pan.

Later that day, after the shower ended and Tink and I were driving elsewhere, he suddenly laughed.

“What?” I asked, puzzled.

Still chuckling, he said, “Boy, your gift didn’t go over well. Like a lead ballon.”

I was “bumfuzzled” as Mama would say. “What are you talking about?”

“Did you see the look on their faces when they opened the frying pan?”

Incidentally, it’s not just for frying. It makes great cornbread.

“They liked it.” I said defensively.

“Oh no, they didn’t. They tried to look happy but the smiles weren’t real.”

“Well, it will come in very handy.”

Later, Nicole insisted they loved it. I received a nice note that mentioned specifically that it was “seasoned.”

Downcast, I didn’t even mention that from time to time, it has to be re-seasoned with oil and salt.

And Tink? He’s still laughing.

Ronda Rich is the bestselling author of “Sapelo Island: A Stella Bankwell Mystery.” Visit www. rondarich.com to sign up for her free weekly newsletter.