It may be the only holiday on the calendar that rhymes.
We’re alluding to a multi-week span of celebrating both “Dads and Grads,” in which Father’s Day shares the spotlight with all those hardworking students who are jubilantly tossing mortarboards into the air — and somehow you have to come up with gifts to celebrate the hard work of both.
Two things are certain: Dad doesn’t need (or necessarily even want) another tie, and gold pens for grads are about as passe as teaching penmanship in school.
Here are more ideas to inspire you and get your creative juices flowing:
• Something (Semi-) Practical. Every kid going off to college or graduate school will want to personalize his or her new living space. If they’re budding entrepreneurs, they’ll probably genuflect before a framed art print of the original 1984 Macintosh computer, which was just named No. 3 on Time magazine’s list of “The 50 Most Influential Gadgets of All Time.”
And if the print includes an inspirational quote from Apple co-founder Steve Jobs himself — a la “The people who are crazy enough to change the world often do” — so much the better.
• Something They’ll Always Remember. It’s been said that watches “telegraph” who we are — or who you aspire to be — to the rest of the world. So when The Wall Street Journal uses the word “perfect” to describe Baume & Mercier’s Clifton line of watches for men, you know they’ll be appreciated for years to come.
Does Dad like to channel his inner “Mad Men” masculine elegance of decades past? Then the ideal Father’s Day gift is the Clifton 10055 watch. It has a 43 mm case, a black alligator strap, a sun satin finish, a silver-colored dial with moon phase, day, month and central hand functions. It’s sure to give dad a memory he’ll never forget.
As for grads, one reviewer gushed that the affordable new Classima 10214 model from the same Swiss watchmaker — complete with 40 mm polished steel case, blue steel hands, Roman numerals and a lined guilloche decor dial — enables those “on the threshold of their careers to treat themselves to a watch on a par with their ambitions.” Shop both watches at www.baume-et-mercier.com or by calling 1-800-MERCIER. Free gift wrapping and engraving are offered for all purchases.
• Something They Can Do Together. It bears repeating that fathers, as Psychology Today says, not only “provide (their children) with approval and recognition,” but also help them become “more autonomous and self-assertive.”
In other words, they can never bond enough.
Ergo, buy dad and your grad tickets to some event they both like — be it a ball game or a concert — and maybe even spring for dinner out afterwards.