The Gift Which Could Keep Giving by Jody Feldman

We’ve been asked what unobtainable gift would you want to receive. So far, you may have read about some wonderfully lofty and beautifully altruistic ideas. There’s also peace on earth. Universal acceptance of and support for libraries and librarians. To be ruler of the Milky Way. (Nah. Too much trouble.) All are perfectly perfect. 

And yet there's another way to answer this, to wish for obtainable things that require more money than I can comprehend. Everything has a price, they say. 

No, it's not ballooning. Just blue-skying it.

So, that's the road I'm taking today. But as I sit here, blue skying it, I'm debating between two things. *tick tick tick* Still deciding. *tick tick--

Solution!
Owning one thing might give me so much more.
Ready for it?

An NFL team. Yes, as in football. 

I’ve loved the game ever since that hot September day when I was three years old and our air conditioning went out. I lay spread eagle on my parents’ bed to cool off, their small TV tuned to a bunch of people running around on wide expanse of grass. Many of them had these towers on the sides of their strange hats, whatever they were. I didn’t know. But I did know I was drawn to the criss-cross design which turned out to be oil derricks on the side of the Houston Oilers helmets. I’ve followed football ever since.

So, I want an NFL team. But why that instead of my second choice, one or two of my favorite Renoir paintings? Simple.

If I owned an NFL team, a guaranteed mega moneymaker, I could afford nearly anything I wanted. Maybe not peace on earth but, ah, those libraries...

Jody Feldman covets many of the Renoir painting she's seen in Paris, Chicago, New York, and where she lives in St. Louis. She needs to get herself to The Barnes in Philadelphia which, she understands, has a sizable collection, including works by other favorite artists. She's pictured here, at the Musee de Montmartre, in a set of gardens dedicated to Renoir.