How much I hate shopping

Everyone who knows me knows that I defy the stereotype that girls love shopping. I know, can you believe it? But to my mind, HOW could anyone POSSIBLY love shopping?!?!? Why the FUCK would I enjoy parting ways with my money that I took no small pains to earn for something that I might not end up liking in a few months, when instead I could be putting it in an account to earn 3% interest for things that actually might be important in the future (rent, car payments, etc.)??

I suppose this may seem to mean that I’m just naturally frugal, but I’m actually not the cutting-coupons type; I’m actually kind of bad at that sort of stuff. I suppose I just think it’s easier not to buy something than to have to take the trouble to buy it for less. And so I spend money on those things which I absolutely need to (e.g. gas), or things I try to resist but can’t help myself and buy it anyway (e.g. the occasional latte). I think this comes from when I was growing up, when we were so poor that I hardly ever got what I wanted (including violin lessons, which most (rich) parents would be thrilled for their child to actually want), and I suppose this got ingrained in me, along with contempt for all of consumer society (could that just be a way of sugaring the bitter pill of deprivation, thinking that it’s not that I CAN’T participate, but that I’m too ABOVE it to want to? Possibly, but if so, I don’t want to be disabused of that illusion.).

Anyway, the downturn in the economy has, not surprisingly, exacerbated this tendency, and there’s a specific example that has even me sort of horrified. So, I’ve had a job for the past month that requires “business” wear, which means wearing my only slightly bearable office-setting-appropriate heels. And every day I think about buying some comfortable flats, but every day I balk at the notion of plunking down any amount for shoes when my job is only temporary, I still have Christmas presents to get, and the economy could make my situation even lousier at any moment. Essentially, I’m trying not to spend money on anything I can actually resist, and even though I’m a girl, I find shoes and clothing of any kind eminently resistible (just ask anyone who’s seen my ridiculous array of drab outfits).

This may sound like I should just shut up and not get them, but meanwhile I can only hobble like a block in the heels I’m wearing. One of my ankles has started hurting. I don’t even know what bunions are, but I’m pretty sure I’m getting them. And this is where long-term and short-term thinking come in. Who knows: I could actually be slowly injuring myself with the shoes I have and end up paying more to a doctor than I would have if I had just bought some damn shoes. And yet I still adamantly refuse to.

It’s even more than just a refusal, actually: it’s almost a physical AVERSION to it.
I’ve tried. Recently, I walked into a shoe store, started looking around, and when the salesman asked if I needed help, I bolted. I suppose this is an issue for another blog entry, but I hate, HATE salespeople. They act as though merely your entering the store is a promise that you’ll buy something, and if you don’t, seem utterly offended. You haven’t noticed this? Then it’s probably just my proletarian projection of guilt. But it’s more than that: it’s that the whole process of making someone fetch shoes at your bidding reeks of the hierarchy of a capitalistic society.

I’m sorry for elaborating on such a seemingly banal circumstance, but I think it illustrates how far I’ll go these days to avoid shopping, in spite of my girlness. :P