I Left My Heart (Cart) At Target

I Left My Heart (Cart) at Target Current mood: overstimulated Category: Fashion, Style, Shopping
I am weird. I have tried for many years to hide this fact. But I've been told that to acknowledge your problem is the first step towards recovery. I don't know how one recovers from being weird, but recovery is not necessarily my end goal. I'm trying to explain a portion of my weirdness to Austin. He's been a little confused...but perhaps you are as well? I'll begin, as they say, at the beginning.

I dropped Moira off at church for her class. Woe be unto me if she doesn't get to Rainbows on a Sunday eve. Austin has a Veritas class (surprising, I know) but there isn't much else on campus. Well, ok...there is a service. But like any good former church brat, I eschew more than one church service on a given day. It tends to make me slightly itchy and hypersensitive to Irritating Church Members, who inevitably feel that they NEED to go to church EVERY TIME the doors are open. Bless their hearts.

I didn't really feel like going to service, I didn't want to sit in the playground while Sabra climbed into the playground abyss and got lost. I didn't want to see if any classes needed extra help, because I'd already helped in two children's classes that morning. (You are virtually patting my back, I know)

I wasn't sure where to go. For some reason, malls feel like the need to close at 6 on Sundays. This would make sense if it were indeed in honor of the Sabbath. However, it is not. Thus, it is an annoyance. I could have been perusing Origins for a new lip gloss or letting Sabra play with the toys at Disney's Plush Mountain.

I worked at Starbucks for what felt like 92 years. Sometimes I can put this aside and go read a book while be-boppy little teenagers order their Frappucinos ("Can you, like, make that without coffee?") but most of the time, Starbucks still just feels like work.

Sunday night in the Bible Belt offers rather slim pickins for entertainment/amusement/mildly interesting things. Well, it probably isn't the Belt's fault. There aren't many things to do anywhere in the evening with a kid that doesn't cost much money or require a zoo pass.

So Sabra and I pointed our car towards that destination that saves many a lost soul; the beacon of random need, the bull's eye of everything and nothing: we went to Target.

I put her in a cart and we ambled around the store. I found a really cute cropped green cardigan that I really wanted to buy. I put it into the cart...I took it out of the cart....I put it into the cart....I took it out of the cart.

"Hmm....I haven't bought any clothes this pay period. I probably have the money. Dang it! I haven't written on my little Dave Ramsey sheet in FOREVER. If I had, I would know EXACTLY how much clothing allowance I have left. Crap. Not sure what to do. I'll think about it. Might as well put it into the cart so I don't have to come back and get it."

I may or may not have said this out loud. If I did, I'm sure Sabra nodded her assent and sang Happy Birthday to me. It is her new favorite song.

Off we went to peruse the shoe aisle, the baby section...oh...let's pick up some sippy cups...thank heavens Sabra finally stopped using bottles....ooh, entertainment section...

Sabra and I pushed into the fabulous $5.50 movie aisle. Sometimes these selections are dull indeed, what with the little known 1982 remake of Cleopatra and cartoon version of Texas Chainsaw Massacre. But we found many exciting options, including The Anchorman. This movie, though not quite appropriate for children under the age of 14 or men of any age (kind of redundant) is very very funny. Ron Burgendy reaches the apex of poetic philosophy when he exclaims, "I'm trapped in a glass cage of emotion!"

This movie was a STEAL! I had to buy it! I could just see us cuddled on the couch, laughing and sharing a bowl of popcorn. i hate popcorn though. Maybe I would have those Rosemary Triscuits with cheese. Ooh, need to go to grocer aisle. Definitely buying this movie. It will save me money in the long run. Yes. Am soon to be proud new owner of funny movie.

Oh! I really should check to see if they have any Blue's Clues movies. Those are a rare find because the show isn't as cool anymore. They should never have let Steve go. He was a diamond in the rough. A lovable but dorky, striped shirt genius who has a slight obsession with American Sign Language. It all went downhill when that stupid Joe took over. He is just dumb and uncool. Jockitch Joe.
But they DO have a Blue's Clues DVD! What are the odds?! It's as if the Target gods heard my silent plea for sanity while I make dinner! A DVD full of old school Blue! Yes, this is a necessity. Sabra needs a new DVD. All her other BC movies are VHS, and someday our VCR will break and we'll just have to buy another one, which costs money. I'll save us some frustration by purchasing this digital video device option.

Hmm. Can't get Sabra a movie but not Moira. Too bad they are just far apart enough to not love all the same movies. They might unite under the banner of Strawberry Shortcake, but those movies make me have murderous thoughts about little girls with strawberry hats. The theme song gets stuck in my head, and it isn't even clever. Straw-ba-baw-baw-ba-berry is repeated thirty seven times before the scene opens to a meadow flowing with blueberry muffins and a sea of ice cream. Sub-par Willy Wonka, if you ask me.

I refuse to spend my hard-earned money on that fluff and stuff trash media. They can rent it from Netflix. Yes, this spends my money too, but it feels different. Hmm. Looking at rows of kid movies....hate it, hate it, own it, hate it, own it, tada! Return to Neverland. I love me some Peter Pan. Not sure why, as the real book of Peter Pan is very strange. Did you know that Tinkerbell always refers to Pan as 'you silly little ass'? If not, you should go read it. Also of interest is that Moira's name is in Peter Pan. Wendy's full name is Wendy Moira Angela Darling. Moira would be really happy if I brought this movie home. Ok, movie selections are complete. I should go to the food aisle and get those Triscuits.

Cereal, I need that. Oh my gosh I LOVE that Target has cheap but yummy knock-offs. Archer Farms keeps my family fed; because it sure isn't me. Ok, kids also need some school snacks. Hmm. I really wish that Moira wasn't allergic to nuts and fruits and vegetables and guar gum and red dye 40. That really narrows my quick easy and cheap options. (sigh) Well, I'll just do the staples then: cinnamon applesauce, graham cracker sticks, juice boxes, (ew, why are there Pop-Tarts with cartoon scenes on them?) and some cheese cracker twisty things that Sabra stole from the shelves. She'll eat them. She would eat anything. Except, of course, whatever I fix for her lunch.

Ok, am heading STRAIGHT to checkout. Almost time to go, not to mention that I have all kids of needless things in my TOOTHBRUSHES! I'm not sure why I love toothbrushes so much, but I do. A new toothbrush is really exciting. But I don't need one. I'll bet if I bought one of those Hannah Montana singing toothbrushes, Moira would happily bounce out of bed in the mornings to go clean her teeth. Yep, is a good investment against future cavities. Sabra will be jealous without one. CareBear singing toothbrush goes into the cart.

I pass the crazy bathroom mirrors that make my pores look like a measuring cup full of funk. But I don't care; those mirrors are stupid anyways and HOLY CRAP! My roots need did. Yessir, I have a dirty dishwater blonde inch of growth. Ok, I'll stop really fast for a new box of hair dye. What color did I use last time? That picture looks familiar. But so does that one. And that one. I have dyed my hair waaaay too much. Should I go reddish-brown again or back to blonde? Wow! That bright red looks totally sassy on the hair model. Austin might bust a vein if I came out of the bathroom with that on my head. The desire to purchase this vein-popping color is increased tenfold. Maybe he won't think I'm pretty anymore. What do I care? I'm strong and independent and I....need self-affirmation before I can purchase this or any other hair color.

I called my sister for the hair coloring advice I need for purchase. She didn't answer. I left the hair aisle.

I looked frantically through the makeup aisle for eye makeup remover. My face cleaner just really doesn't do the trick in this one area. I look like a scary post-breakup sorority girl every night (sort of) when I wash my face. I never miss a night, ever. Maybe I should get a new cleanser? I don't normally buy cleanser at this store, but then again, the financial belt is getting a teensy bit too tight. I could just use soap.

I gave the face soap section (which is 8 miles long) a frantic perusal. Now I know why I pay an extra dollar to go to the counter. They are there to keep my social disorder/panic attack/feeling of overwhelming bottles of cleanser coming to eat me at bay. I tell them something about my skin and they hand me a bottle and ask for my credit card. I never use those evil things, so I give them my money and they hand me a pretty bag tied with raffia and an organic cotton and beet ink embossed sticker.

I really need to get out of here. Target is sweltering tonight! Geez, is everybody 7% body fat here? I feel positively menopausal! Sabra is trying to escape...wants to be held....reaching for a 37 dollar pack of batteries. I don't think I need batteries. Maybe I do...should I call Austin? He's teaching Veritas. He's always teaching Veritas. I don't remember the steps of exegesis anymore. That is embarrassing. Hope he never asks me to exegete a passage of scripture. He probably won't; I don't appear to have loads of talent in that department.

I'm nearing the checkout. I look in my cart which has SOMEHOW FILLED ITSELF WITH MOVIES AND CLOTHES AND FOOD AND BATTERIES!!!!!

I head over to the swimsuit section which is empty because HELLO TARGET it is 47 degrees outside and Tennessee isn't exactly full of tiny skinny people (except for you, of course). Sabra and I have a chat about what we should buy. She wants to get out and look in the mirror. I look in the mirror. I need to pluck my eyebrows. Where oh where did my blush go? I look washed out. And scared. And very very overwhelmed.

I squeeze all those inner muscles that get squeezed when you get nervous...somewhere betwixt the brain and the belly...and pick Sabra up off the floor. I pick up my purse and talk to her calmly as I walk slowly out the door, the security guard looking at me as if I have lost my mind.

I want to turn to him and say "Yes! I have lost my mind! I might find it somewhere in the media department, but I just really cannot afford to go back there because I might come back with 6 Wii remotes and a 87 inch television!"

Austin didn't understand the issue. He thinks I'm weird. I think I might just be female. He wanted to know what I was thinking. I told him: "I wasn't thinking anything!"

And now that I think about it....that is exactly the case. I wasn't thinking about anything. I was thinking about everything.

Men might not understand. They can run into the grocery store and buy the milk and bread with nary a thought. But I can't go in without having some sort of existential crisis. I just. keep. thinking. and thinking.about. bloody. everything.

I left my cart at Target. My brain might be inside it somewhere. My heart may very well be there also, trying on a bikini it knows will never work. At any rate, I need to go back and retrieve what is mine.

And I also really want that green cardigan.