Glory Box

If I am to explain ‘glory box’ to someone who doesn’t know —–It is comparable to a bride’s trousseau… difference being, latter is collected during the engagement period, and former is a long term exercise…. long before the girl had even reached puberty and much more elaborate and extensive.

I read an interesting book about Lebanese girls, customs, marriages, and glory boxes. I must mention, although the book was specifically about Lebanese girls, the ‘glory box’ however is not a culturally significant practise to Lebanese alone.

Reading the book reminded me of a conversation I had with a neighbour once.

My daughter was still at primary school when M – my elderly Caucasian neighbour –asked me if I had started my daughter’s Glory Box. My perplexed “her what?” was lost in her preconceived mind that it is a given fact all cultural practices are the same…….so she went on to narrate her story of how and when she started her glory box and mind you, few years later when we moved out of the area she presented me with some doilies and asked me to put it in my daughters’ glory box. I said “um…o k”. I don’t know where those doilies are today….it should be somewhere in the house : ) She was a lovely neighbour and I love her dearly, but………..

Back to the book—-Some girls portrayed in the book have accumulated incredible amounts of household goods….. they are now called ‘glory garages’. The mothers usually start off when the daughters are about 10-11 and the daughters take it off in their teen years.

One particular girl had amassed half a garage full of glory purchases over the years. Some examples… 16 dinner sets, 30 bath towels, 36 drinking glasses, 3 bedspreads, (the numbers are not typos) among heaps of other acquisitions, that will perhaps fill two or three houses. She is in her mid twenties, no boyfriend as yet and refuses to marry someone of her parents choosing (at least she has moved away from that tradition) yet still heavily involved in her glory purchases by frequenting all major sales. Her justification, apart from just parroting tradition, is that she is buying them all on sales! I am talking serious buying of ‘quality goods’, ‘fine china’ etc, not cheap ‘made in China’. She then has an annual stock take to evaluate necessary purchases for the next year.

Reading the book and pondering, I realised……this is a good example of blind following of tradition. Perhaps these ‘traditions’ were started during the great depression, I don’t know…. anyway……

Why do people follow tradition for mere sake of it? Household goods go out of fashion…..Look weathered with time… Linen will smell musty….and so on and so forth.

The new generation following these traditions are more educated, living in a progressive world and I presume capable of logical thinking than their parents. This is what perplexes me about blind followers of some tradition in any society.

I understand the fact not everyone can easily veer from tradition but where is the logic? ….traditions like these could easily be modernised if one wishes to carry them on for whatever reasons.

Just imagine……… the money was invested over the years instead…… and the investments grew…….. She would have bought better, newer versions of household goods and most of all, fresh smelling ones. Perhaps not sixteen dinner sets at once but manageable amounts and she still would’ve continued the tradition of furnish /equip the house before marriage and be financially stronger for it. Besides, sales are still an occurrence in the world.

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