Today was one of those days. Ian's ear was hurting so I had to pick him up early from school and get him into the doctor to have it checked. All this went smoothly. The ear is fine, he has allergies. No big surprise there considering that J and I are both dueling the pollen beasties at the moment.
So, we're driving back home and it occurs to me that I'll be going by a store that I needed to pick something up at tomorrow. The kids were getting along and I decided to dash in with them.
I was accosted. Twice. And this was after being accosted on the way into and out of WalMart in search of a cake mix to make for my mom's birthday. AND on the way into Safeway (next door to WalMart) to get Lily some water.
Some strange man hollered at me on the way in that, didn't I want to buy some candy for a good cause?" I tried to nicely tell him, "No, thank you" while wrangling the kids into the store but this kind of thing makes me instantly redline. We got our stuff, and we were good to go. I step back out of the store and this same guy is still trying to get me to pony up, "It's just a dollar." This is where I lose it. We turned on our heels and got into the car. The embarrassing thing is that I didn't take my stress out on that guy. My kids got the brunt of it since they were heckling each other in the back seat. I really need to work on that. I have this intense need for silence following this kind of crap. Situations like this just make me want to scream and who knows? Maybe that guy is an axe murderer and would have pounded me if I'd gone off on him.
What is with these people? I give at church and I give at Ian's school and to pretty much anyone that doesn't want me to buy something. I always keep a bit of cash in my wallet to give to someone to buy food or whatever. Really, I mean, what if that person was Jesus for crying out loud? But it's just beyond aggravating when they want to SELL me something. We don't have TV because I can't stand the advertising. I feel like something is wrong with the world. How can it be that everything seems to ultimately distill to advertising and sales revenue? It makes me sick.
About Me
- Sarah Hallford
- Homeschooling Mother of Two, Licensed Manicurist, Runner, Retired Figure Skater
2 comments:
Nope. We tried cable with a DVR for less than a week after we moved here in February. By the second day, Ian dissolved into tears in the grocery store because we weren't buying "the candy he saw on tv". And the product tie ins to every kid's show was astonishing. It was just sickening.
All the stuff we watch is on DVD from Netflix so it's not like we don't see anything, but we get to watch it w/o commercials.
At the moment we have:
The Big Lebowski (a perennial favorite)
Justice League (season1)
The High Cost of Low Prices (all about Walmart)
The Koala Brothers--We're here to help.
Buffy (season 3, disc 3) should show up tomorrow.
S
Ah, the raging consumerism of America these days ... It reminds me of Easter, when I took Adam to a community easter egg hunt. There were probably at least 1000 people there. They had huge (~100' diameter) circles roped off, with an easter egg just sitting on the ground every square foot or so. After the great countdown, everyone crossed the barrier and swarmed on the eggs. It was all over in less than a minute, and during the melee, I saw one parent holding their 1 1/2 or 2-year-old in one arm along with the basket, and picking up eggs as fast as possible. The child's role was nothing more than to slow down the parent. I wanted to yell at him/her (the gender wasn't immediately apparent ... remember the old SNL skit "It's Pat"?) - but it was all over too quickly. As I was leaving the scene of the crime, I passed at least a couple kids who were crying because they didn't get any eggs at all (this mongering parent probably had 50).
Anyway, when I got home I showed the video to Trish and we agreed that this represented everything that is wrong with holidays in America - the commercialism, the raging greed, etc etc etc etc.
I guess this is a long-winded way of saying I agree, S ... it is all about the sales revenue, and it's really sad.
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