My neighbor and his many uncomfortable gifts…

by Sanyukta Shukla

I have a neighbor, an older man, always smiling, and very fond of my daughter.

Our sweet neighbor got gifts for my daughter when she was 2–3 months old. He got her 4 dresses, a hat and some shoes.

We accepted the gifts and thanked him for his gesture.

When she was 6 months old he got gifts for her again. This time a few toys, a few dresses and a teething ring.

We politely tried declining them but he insisted that we keep them and said he would be sad if we declined the gifts.

Reluctantly, we accepted the gifts.

Same thing repeated when she turned 9 months old. Now he just left the gift bag at our door when we were away, so that he doesn’t have to talk us into accepting them (he mentioned this later to us).

Today, he left a bag of goodies again for her at our door.

It really is getting very uncomfortable.

We’d invited him over for dinner a few times (at least to return the favor) but he says he only eats what he cooks for himself.

We tried giving him gift cards on multiple occasions but he refuses them saying we are much younger than him so he won’t accept gifts/cards from us.

We don’t know how to return the favor. What he does is very sweet but it makes us uncomfortable.

Never knew it was possible for too much goodness to make someone uncomfortable?

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Sanyukta Shukla is a research scientist at the University of Florida.

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2 Comments on “My neighbor and his many uncomfortable gifts…”

  1. your neighbour is your daughter's guidian Angel…lols….he might just be doing that out of kind gesture nothing attached….just make sure you pray over the gift when next it arrives.

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