You can feel free to disagree with me and I know that the mishloach manos police will likely come after me and decorate my front lawn in tissue paper shreds in protest, but mishloach manos has gotten out of hand, both in number and in contents. I think we have also lost our focus and have gotten more caught up on what we want to send as opposed to what the recipient might enjoy receiving. It seems to me that mishloach manos is like any other gift you give and presenting your 65-year-old neighbor with Fruit by the Foot, Fruity Pebbles and a juice box of fruit punch, because your whole family is dressed as fruit salad, is about as smart as me giving my teenage son a cute Kate Spade clutch for his birthday. Both could potentially be great gifts, if given to the right person, but are clearly bad choices for those particular recipients. Spend a little bit of time thinking backwards and figure out what people might actually want to get and then if you feel the need to coordinate your mishloach manos and your costumes, work backwards from there.
Finally, make sure that items you are sending are clearly labeled as to their kashrus status. Anything that isn’t pareve should have some indication as to whether it is meat or dairy. I have been sending soup for mishloach manos for years and it took several phone calls from recipients to make me realize that I better let people know if it was cooked in a meat, dairy or pareve pot. Similarly, if you are sending to a house where you know there are allergic people, check the ingredients to make sure you aren’t creating any problems because it isn’t fun to have to pry candy out of an allergic child’s hands and say, “Sorry, sweetie, you can’t eat this.”
I promise you I am not looking to spoil anyone’s Purim fun. But I think if we are going to be giving people gifts, it is well worth the time giving them a gift that will be truly appreciated, not one that will get tossed into the nearest trashcan.
Ok, enough pontificating for me. Time to peel more glue dots off my fingers.