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Now we are in between the gift-giving season of Christmas and the Ang Pow (Red Packet) season of Lunar New Year it is a good time to ask about Greetings and Thanks (G&T). You probably have been – or shortly will be – on the receiving end of greetings, perhaps in the form of cards, and gifts. What has been your response? Did you say thank-you? If so, how? Was your ‘thank you’ a perfunctory mantra or did you write imaginative, creative thoughts for the person whose kindness you were acknowledging?

‘Thank you’ is a two-little-words phrase most people are taught to say when they are growing up. Have you noticed them saying it after reaching maturity? Would you say ‘less and less’, perhaps? If so, that seems to me to be a shame. But even if you get the two little words could they not be more elegantly expressed, accompanied by some information, news of what has been happening to the thanker? To me, two-little-words is sometimes too-little-words.

Sending colourful cards at times of festival and joy is a lovely idea. Even better if you have made them yourself. Many today produce a ‘round robin’ newsletter. Some scoff at these but they are a genuine attempt to keep friends and relations informed. As such they are valuable, even if the saga of the cat up the tree was more impactful locally than internationally.

Maybe you did not get thanked for your gift. How did you feel about that? Did it predispose you to redouble your efforts to think of something nice to give the next time or was the recipient relegated to the “we can re-cycle that” pile? Novel and imaginative ways of saying thank you are always welcome. At least the giver will remember that s/he has been thanked.

A kind and knowledgeable boss and Mentor once took my wife and me to the opera at Covent Garden in London. It was a touching performance of Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice. The lead singer was Yvonne Minton, then a brilliant up-and-coming Australian soprano. My boss was a rich man who lived alone. Flowers seemed inappropriate, a bottle of wine, superfluous. So to say thank-you I arranged a small dinner party with Yvonne Minton and her husband. We went to a famous restaurant called Boulestin near the opera house. At midnight, Miss Minton sang an aria for us all. My friend said he had never been thanked so imaginatively. He remembered the gesture for the rest of his life.

Less happy occasions are when we have to write to console someone for a lost friend or spouse. It always surprises me that condolence letters talk about the deceased when they should be addressing the living, those who have suffered loss and bereavement. At these times the person needing help is the one left behind.

Elaborate, gushing thanks are not what are required. A little effort to show that some thought and time has been spent on acknowledging the kindness shown is an investment in something more than future gifts or relationships.

It is a prayer of gratitude that comes back to our own spirit.