THE COOL KID'S GUIDE TO READING: Unique uses of books and writing make for special gifts

Because Christmas falls on a Friday this year, I'm running my Halloween column a day late.

Excuse me? Oh, logic. Charles Richardson's column is in the Opinion section. You might want to look there.

Buh-bye.

Now that the Ancient Greeks have left the room, O Best Ones, let's get back to it.

But first, a warning: If you think my Halloween column will be something as mundane as recommending horror novels, you are in the wrong place, too. Tell the philosopher types hanging around the Opinion section that I sent ya, Zeno.

The Cool Kid's Guide to Reading is not a column about books, anyway. Nor is it actually a column about reading. It's a column about a column about reading.

Some might say it's fundamentally wrong to write about a column about a column at the exact time you write the mentioned afore column. And because folks say that stuff, God gave us equal numbers of index fingers and ear holes.

Hmmm. You know what? I have completely lost track of this column's point and/or purpose.

O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beast and men have lost their reason. Shakespeare stole from Holinshed, so I steal from Bill.

I remember now. This is my belated Halloween column, wherein I recommend Christmas gifts.

Christmas. Halloween. It begins to make sense now, does it not? It does? I, uhmm, I meant it that way. I did. Indeed, I did.

My gift suggestions, you see, are tricks and treats.

Boom!

Wheels within wheels, chum. Never ending or beginning on an ever spinning reel. (I also steal from Dusty Springfield.)

And those scrambled eggheads over at the Opinion section are gonna miss out because ... they ... just ... couldn't ... be ... patient.

Books and writing are the focus of my gift ideas, natch.

But more than that, they're about love and effort. These gifts are for the person you can't live without. And I'm sharing them early because they take some time to make.

NOTABLE ACHIEVEMENT

Let's start with a treat.

I gave this one to Mrs. Cool Kid on our third anniversary. But it works just as well for Christmas.

The day after our second anniversary, I bought a bunch of sticky notes -- in different colors. I wrote "I love you" on one, with the date "Jan. 11" under it. And every day for a year I wrote another note along with the date.

Sometimes the note was about a special memory. Sometimes it was part of a poem or lyric. Sometimes it was something such as "Your eyes in joy."

I hid the notes away.

On the morning of our third anniversary, I got up early and put the notes, in random order, all over our living room. Then I sat there and waited.

When she woke up, came in the room and saw the notes, Mrs. Cool Kid was confused. But as she looked closely at them and realized what I had done ...

Through her tears, I saw her eyes in joy.

Obviously, you'd have to do this one for Christmas 2016. It doesn't take effort so much as discipline. There were times I felt like skipping one and doing two the next day, but I didn't want to taint it, even if she wouldn't have known.

And Mrs. Cool Kid did something that made the gift even more special. That morning, she found and took down the Jan. 11 note. And every day after, she would hunt for that date's note and take it down.

So the gift that took a year to make lasted a whole other year. And its memory will last as long as one of us lives.

A VERY VALUABLE BOOK

Here's a trick I played on Mom many a Christmas ago.

As the family was exchanging presents that Christmas Eve, my mother opened her gift from me to discover she now owned a copy of Livy's "History of Rome."

Mom was no big reader and her extreme lack of interest in Ancient Rome was so powerful that it probably was a factor in the fall of the empire.

She wasn't disappointed so much as perplexed. But Mom being Mom, she thanked me. She was used to her beloved elder son being on a tangent most of the time.

Later, after all the gifts were opened, after the noshes were noshed and after my brother read from the Bible, I picked up the book that Mom had laid aside and sidled up to her.

"If you don't like it, just say so," I faked fumed.

Then I opened the book and ripped a page apart. Actually, I ripped two pages apart -- because they were glued together.

What I had done, weeks before, was take $100 in fives and painstaking glued each bill between two pages. And I say painstaking because it was slow, methodical work to keep the bills centered and the pages flat with the edges correctly lined up. Trial and error. I think it was on the third book that I finally got it right.

But it was worth it to see Mom's shock turn to delight.

Mom loved to shop, so she always liked to get cash as a gift. I bet someone you love does, too.

A BOOK WITH A DIFFERENT KIND OF VALUE

This one, both a trick and a treat, I once gave to a girlfriend. (Sorry, Mrs. Cool Kid. I had to do something while I was waiting for you.)

Buy a book and a highlighter pen. Read through the book and use the pen to highlight words that remind you of your loved one -- words such as beautiful, strong, devoted and (if the giftee is a fun sort) inexplicable.

This one takes time because you basically have to read the whole book. But it's time well spent. When you're done, wrap it up, put a bow on it and wait for the appreciation.

It got this idea from the movie "Mystery, Alaska" -- where the character played by Russell Crowe used a newspaper instead of a book.

My, I was quite the little thief in this column. Good thing the government is into letting people out of prison these days instead of putting them in.

To contact writer Randy Waters, call 744-4240 or email rwaters@macon.com.

This story was originally published October 31, 2015 at 7:43 PM with the headline "THE COOL KID'S GUIDE TO READING: Unique uses of books and writing make for special gifts ."