My Little Gnudren,

One of the vexatious and time-consuming activities in many of our lives is picking a Birthday Card or card to mark some such celebration in the life of a person you feel duty bound to send a card. The whole business of going out to buy a card, write it, find a stamp and addressing the envelope is a burden that weighs heavily on many of us. Of course, we can resort to eCards and be done with all this. You simply enjoy some, usually intriguing, animations from the comfort of an armchair, choose one, write a brief scrawl and simply press ‘send’ and that’s an end of the what could have been a vexatious business.

Mrs. Gnu was in the past in the habit of occasionally going around card shops and buying up all the cheap cards of all varieties and sticking them in a bulging box at home. Come the next need for a card and all you do is rummaging through the box and find something vaguely appropriate. Yes, if you have received a card from the Gnu household it was probably very cheap and had been languishing in a shop for ages, but she thought it was good enough for you.

But even with this large cross section of cards stashed away it often seems quite difficult to match the card to the person and occasion. But why unnecessarily agonise over this. Use ingenuity and humour and change/deface a card to suit the person and your purposes.

For example, if you need to send a birthday card to someone who is always protesting that they are getting old, why not send them something like this:

Of course, one must be discreet about the level of humour. For example, the following would not be suitable to send as a wedding greetings card:

If the recipient of your card is a church member, you could send them a card with Bible verse. These can be obtained from Christian literature bookshops, most of which alas have disappeared off the high street. But you can still get them online.Here is one that is reminds us of the goodness of God.

If however your fellow congregation member is always negative about life despite her/his mental affirmation of the goodness of God, you could modify the card in such a way as to point up their folly:

Old Gnu mentions one other option to making the sending of greetings cards a joy rather than a matter of frustration. You can always add your own Bible verse to a card you’ve purchased.  Blank cards are particularly suitable for this although cards with specific wishes on them can be adapted. For example, this blank card is shouting to be adapted as a Get Well Soon card.

And the obvious Bible passage that immediately comes to our minds is 2 Kings 20. So just write it in!

My little Gnudren we get vexed about so many unnecessary things. But with the help of God let us turn situations of potential frustration into opportunities for happiness and creativity. Cheers!

Vetus Pater Gnu  [he/haw]
Academiae Musicorum et Theologia
Turris LA
X  Mensis Iunni MMXXIII