2002 Soap Box Archives

Shopping

When I go shopping I walk into a store and say something like, ”Have you
got this in my size?” If the answer is yes I’ll say something like,”Ok
I’ll take the red one,” pull out my wallet, pay the bill and walk out of
the store with my purchase.

Even to do this is just short of drudgery for me, in other words, except
for a very few exceptions,I hate shopping. That’s right, that’s what I
said, I hate shopping.

Traipsing up and down the corridors of some shopping center
or looking for a parking place downtown is just not my favorite way of
spending time and is just a few cuts below the root canal category in my
druthers list.

I also hate buying new cars, trying on clothes, picking out furniture
and everything associated with them. The very thought of Christmas
shopping can throw me into a virtual tailspin.

Now Hazel is the direct opposite of me. She loves shopping.
They seldom have a place to sit down in the places Hazel so loves to
frequent and after standing there for what seems like hours she finally
finds something she likes and just as I’m reaching for my wallet she
says something like,”No I really don’t care for the bow on the back. Do
you have it without the bow?”
Of course they don’t have it without the bow, which instigates
a whole new search for the perfect illusive outfit which doesn’t have
that confounded bow. Heck I could have taken my pocket knife and cut
the bow off the dad blamed thing.

But no, it’s time to go through more racks and racks of garments, and
likely not finding anything among the thousands available which suit
her, she says the dreaded anticipated words, ”Let’s go to Green Hills
Mall,”
and we’re off to the other side of town where hopefully they have
something that suits her fancy.

Shopping is a female sport from my point of view. It’s just something
in the feminine genes that drives them on from shopping center to
shopping center, taking great delight in dragging their disgruntled
spouses along.
They thrive on crosstown traffic and clogged parking lots.

The sight of a sale sign throws them into a frenzy of shopping mania.
Armed with their plastic money they descend on the department stores
like a swarm of locusts, fingering fabric, trying on blouses and trying
to fit an eight sized foot into a seven and a half sized shoe. They
browse acres of storefronts with the astute eye of an eagle always on
the lookout for the reduced price or the buy-one-get-one-free notices.

And you know what the funny thing is, I actually think that the buying
is secondary to the shopping. If women could just pick up the phone and
have the perfect product delivered, the perfect fit, the perfect color
at the absolutely best price ever made available on planet earth, do you
really think that they would do that?

I don’t, I think they would still drive twenty-five miles through rush
hour traffic and go across town to some store with an ad in the Sunday
paper advertising some kind of sale.

I think they would still try on dozens of garments and very possibly not
buy any of them.

A word of advice to you husbands. When your wife wants you to go
shopping with her, grab a good book, find yourself a comfortable sitting
down place and say, “Just take your time dear, I’ll be right here when
you finish shopping.” Grab a cup of Starbucks and relax.

What do you think?

God Bless America

Charlie Daniels