Oct
17
2006
Hollow gestures of generosity
I woke up this morning thinking about the expression, “He’d give you the shirt off his back.” Unless you’re talking about an expensive shirt, or unless the gift of said shirt occurs in the middle of a blizzard, then it’s really not much of a gesture.
Thinking more about it, though, I suppose in the 19th Century or whenever the expression emerged that a shirt was a valuable thing. How many articles of clothing did an average person have? Probably not a lot. It wasn’t as if it was possible to buy a shirt for $9.99 at the local Walmart.
