Shopping Bulimia

When it comes to shopping, I am sort of a feast or famine type girl.  

I can't remember, really, what I was like in high school or college, but I can remember the years after college.

I was working for a non-profit, in the cattle industry, and not really making all that much money, but it didn't matter because I had NO time.   I didn't shop, I didn't even THINK about shopping.  We simply existed, days running into weeks, into months, and the rent constantly past due.    Every so often, though, there would be a lull.  The first one was the ice storm.  Couldn't get to work, but we could get to Wal-Mart.

Several hundred dollars later and I had a brand new apartment, it seemed like.  A telephone, a new television (and antennae) new dishes and new silverware and new canister set. Loads upon loads of things that I hadn't particularly planned on buying but I didn't have, so, why not?   Since I rarely spent money (and I didn't even have a savings account) I had the cash.

After that the shopping binges usually centered on clothes.  A work event or special occasion would be looming on the calendar, and my roommate and I would head to the mall.  More then once I was parked in the dressing room while my roomie and random store personnel threw clothes over the top of the door.  I never walked out with just one thing, but with a new wardrobe.

When I was no longer working hectic hours, I was broke. I didn't shop. I didn't go to stores because "why bother looking at things I can't have?"   But every so often. . . generally in the middle of the night, I would head off to Wal-mart and binge.  Usually small, worthless items.  Cassette and VCR tapes, pens and toys.  Sometimes I would talk myself down before I checked out, and I would leave a pile of VHS tapes (and I mean a PILE, 7 or 10, at least) somewhere in the picture frame section of the store and slink out, dejected. 

It was after I was out of debt the purging started.  Load after load taken to charities or simply given away.  Anything that could be used up, I become obsessed with using... I get excited at using the last piece of paper on the notepad.  I love when pens run dry and I have to throw them away.  I won't waste or toss needlessly, but using up anything makes me happy.

It's an odd dynamic around this house, because I am the person who will make a meal out of something that I don't really want, simply to use up the last bit of whatever.  And he is a man that will drink all but one glass of juice, and then stop.  And that container will remain in the fridge for 6 months or more 1/16th of the way full.    I will silently fume.

That weird dynamic carries into shopping.   If I am a bulimic who must control the urge to binge and buy one of everything, he is the foodie.  The shopping connoisseur.  The most skilled of Sommeliers, he will sip and taste and weigh the pros and cons. . . endlessly. . . .until my urge to buy has faded away and I am back in frugal mode, and then he will continue to look and contemplate and nibble. . .until the urge to binge comes over me again.

We re-did the office recently.  Much needed new paint, and a rearranging of furniture led to the need for a new bookcase.  Which led us to shopping, and since the bookcase will hold, primarily, my things, I had a keen interest in this purchase.   By the time we were done, I was ready to buy, had internally justified and was mentally preparing the written justification to this blog, a new couch, a new love seat, the needed bookcase, a new dining room table and chairs, new dishes and silverware and a new bedroom set.

I can't even afford all that.   WE can't even afford all that.   So the urges had to be tamped down, which is easier, in a partnership:  "You decide what you think we should get, and I will get it for us."

He looked uneasy.   "You're sure?"  Followed by "I didn't even know you didn't like my couch."

Oops.   Yes, I was sure.  I was jonesing to buy something..anything...  Never mind that recent Oprah episode where I learned that the pleasure of a material purchase never lasts more then seven months.  The pleasure of new furniture would at least carry me into spring.   Just PICK SOMETHING and let me BUY IT!!!

But he is not a buyer, he is a shopper.  A Shoppie.  His pleasure comes from the process.   This couch or that couch?  Or perhaps the dining room table would make the most sense.  We don't really have a nice coffee table, though....

We bought nothing but the bookcase, which only whetted my appetite, so the next day we were out shopping again.   Sitting on the same couches, eyeing the same tables.    Purchasing nothing.    I got desperate.  Reminded him he had a tax refund coming and we could BOTH buy things and then we could get twice as much stuff!   But still no decisions were made.

A few weeks have passed, and I am over my latest crisis.  I am happy with the bookcase, happy with the office, and ready to sock every penny into savings again. 

He's out shopping, again, looking at furniture.  Worrying over choices and sampling from every couch in the greater Omaha area.   He's still spending his evenings online, searching out the best coffee table, at the best price.

I'm over it.  I don't want any of it.  I don't want to hear about coffee tables any more because nice ones are expensive and we can't afford any of them.

Most of all, I am worried that he won't be over it before I get sick of living frugally and just want to buy something.