I'm Not Buying It

I've always looked at certain characters, onscreen or on paper, and felt them to be rather obvious caricatures. No one actually thinks or behaves that way, I'd think. Then, I'd meet an actual human who did. It's terribly disorienting.

I now know that many behaviors, thoughts and feelings that I'd always assumed to be fictitious or exaggerated are, in fact, common. I don't quite know what to do with this knowledge, though. I still find myself feeling alienated or irritated.

I signed up for an online mothers group because my cousin invited me to. I frequently decline such invitations, because I'm not particularly a joiner. I do not play well with others. I'm in favor of avoiding awkward moments in which no one really knows how to react. But, I love my cousin, I think she's a great mother and online, you can always ignore things or turn off your computer, right? So, I signed up.

A great deal of the interaction in this group is the asking and answering of mom questions – "How do you get stains out of a Little League uniform?" "How do you get your baby to sleep through the night?" "How do you get your husband off the couch and involved in housework?" I frequently read the questions, and if I think I have a good, relevant answer, I'll post an answer. Sometimes, I deliberately do not respond to something, because to do so would be unkind. I read things and find myself thinking, "Are you kidding?" or, "What is wrong with you?" – not what one should say to a total stranger looking for help.

Still, these things will roll around in my head, distracting me.

Recently, a woman wrote in and said that she'd received a designer purse from her aunt and uncle, but she couldn't see herself carrying it, and she'd rather have the money. "It still has the tags on it. Is that enough to prove that it's genuine? Where can I sell it to be sure I'm getting top dollar?" she asked. I don't know why I decided to look at the responses; I have no interest in designer purses. But, I scrolled through the answers.

95% of them were, "Contact me! I'm interested in buying it!" I would not have predicted that. I continually underestimate the average woman's purse fetish. One answer really stopped me. "Are you sure you want to sell it? A nice handbag makes me feel pretty. You might want to keep it," the woman wrote, followed by an emoticon happy face and, "Just something to think about!"

My first gut reaction was entirely uncharitable – "Are you kidding me? This is some woman's life?"  The idea of a woman feeling pretty because of the bag she's carrying is so foreign to me I cannot even express it. I don't even understand feeling pretty because a person has gotten their nails done, and nails are physically part of the body. Being attractive because you have a bag in your hands? Something that you carry around when you need it, then set down when you don't? Are you attractive when you walk out the door to buy your groceries, but unattractive when you carry the groceries into the house, because the grocery bags are ugly? Am I even on the same planet as this woman?

Even figuring that what she meant looks something like: expensive purse = quality person = confidence = attractive, that's still too "out there" for me to contemplate. And, It's a real stretch to get there from, "A nice handbag makes me feel pretty."

I was still mulling this days later when I read another post. This woman was even more puzzling to me.

First, she bemoaned using drug store concealer, but conceded that "in the harsh light of the recession," it might be necessary. I thought back many years to my asking about the whole dislike of "drug store brands." What else was there, I wondered. Pretty much everything I knew about makeup came from TV commercials, meaning that I could tell you brand names and celebrity spokesmodels. I was then introduced to the world of department store makeup, where a single tube or jar could easily cost more than a month's part time job wages. No, thank you. I fled and never looked back.

This woman, after already lowering herself to use the makeup of the masses, discovered that she hadn't been using concealer, she'd been using tinted acne cream. Her horror leaped off the page, with phrases like, "added years to my life – or at least my appearance," "robbed me of my youth," and "set me back dog years." As the youngest child, she said, she'd learned from her older sisters "the critical importance – the necessity – of good eye cream." She was, she was sure, "the only 12-year-old on the block religiously using Christian Dior eye cream." Having broken this cardinal rule practically gave her heart palpitations, it seems.

Wow.

I tried to imagine whether my older sisters had ever told me about "the necessity of good eye cream." I'm willing to say that they may have, but if they did, they were soundly ignored. If my mother had started telling me about eye cream when I was 12 (or 22 or 32 or 42), I would have thought she was exhibiting early onset dementia. Her own mother aggravated her by sending, at least once a year, moisturizer from Michigan, to "combat that harsh Nevada climate." My mom would sigh and put the new bottle next to its unused compatriots.

The only time I've ever worried about moisture on my face is when my usual regimen for washing off my eye makeup at night made my skin feel so tight that I thought blinking might cause it to split. I started using petroleum jelly to clean it off instead, and the tightness went away. I never, even once, wondered about how it might affect my looks. I wipe the makeup away with tissues or toilet paper, for goodness sake. I'm sure that's breaking some obscure rule that I don't know or care about.

As I put this down on paper – OK, into the machine – I was just sure that once I uttered such an opinion publicly, I would hear the same stuff I always hear when I say things like, "I've never been on a diet," or, "Let's go out for pizza:" "Sure, I could do that, if (imagine the tone of voice here) I wanted to look like YOU." So, I went into the bathroom, put my face right up to the mirror and looked. I made faces. I squinted. No wrinkles. None. I must have won the genetic lottery: the secret is to have extremely oily skin and to be fat. Forget face cream – have dessert.

Lest we think that girly concerns are the only thing that puzzles me, stereotypically male behaviors have been annoying me lately, too.

I will never understand the way some people think about their jobs, but lately (of course) there's a lot of discussion about how people feel without their jobs. More people now are losing jobs than I ever recall facing the same situation in the past. In person, in print, on TV, I'm seeing a lot of discussions on joblessness.

I understand the Provider mindset, the idea that the family is depending on your income, and that without it, you're letting them down. That makes perfect sense. What does NOT make sense is having your whole sense of worth as a human being tied up in your employment, and many people – especially men – do.

If you lose your job, do you lose your education, abilities, wit, training, experience and personality? No. Those are what makes you, YOU. Yet so many men feel that every shred of their worth is taken away when they get that pink slip. Oddly enough, they feel it is restored when they get a new job – as long as that job is as prestigious as their last one.

I also cannot make too much sense of advancement angst.  I have seen men tied in emotional knots because they realize that they will probably never rise any higher than they are within their company. Even if they live in a nice house, own a car or two, provide not only the necessities but niceties like sports leagues, dance classes and the like for their families, they will feel enormous stress about never rising higher. Instead of, "Isn't this great? I have a job I'm good at, and it pays my bills," they'll think, "This is it? What will people think? What will they say? I'm better than this!" Knowing that the jobless guys would trade places in a heartbeat doesn't usually help, either. Instead of thinking, "Gee, maybe I'm looking at this the wrong way" the reaction is likely to be, "You just don't understand!"

Concerns about status are not part of my daily reality.

Which brings me to cars.

I love my car. I've loved every car I've ever owned. I give them names, I stroke the dashboard and speak encouragingly or soothingly, depending on the situation. I apologize to them when I hit potholes or have to hit the brakes too hard. A car that looks or sounds like my first car makes me smile. It's just that I don't care much what brand it is, what it cost… It's just a thing.

A useful thing, true. But, that's what a car is for. It gets me and my family and my stuff from place to place. That's all I want out of a car. I do not understand wanting anything else from your car. It's like expecting your refrigerator to prepare and serve the food, as well as store it.

I used to laugh out loud at the auto body place whose commercials urged me, "Don't let your car affect your self esteem!" The point they were trying to get across was that I needed to have any dings, dents and scratches fixed, or my self esteem would suffer. My point is that my self esteem is unaffected by what I drive. My husband pointed out to me once as I was leaving my Rotary meeting that I was climbing into my $500 car with peeling paint, waving at a club member as she climbed into her Porsche Carrera. We would both get home that evening; that's all that mattered to me. I can't stand an unreliable car, but as long as I can count on it, I don't much care about anything else.

I do not understand status symbol cars. I don't care what you drive, as long as you don't expect me to be impressed by it. Telling me that your car has a race car engine, when you only drive it around town, is like saying that you have a space shuttle in your back yard; you don't intend to fly it, but by golly, you own it. If you wanted to, you, you could fly it, maybe up to the lake, but it's enough for you just to own it and know that you could fly it if you wanted to. I'll think that you spend money unwisely and that you're a bit adolescent; I will not think, "OOOOH, he's such a manly man." If you actually drive in races, well, own a race car. If you don't race, realize that you're an ordinary commuter.

I voiced this opinion once to a man who insisted that it took superior skills simply to own such a car, and practically purred at me, "Could you handle all that power?"

"Sure," I said. "I'd drive it to the grocery store and the movies, the same way I drive the car I own now."

That idea gave him high blood pressure. "That isn't the way the car's meant to be driven!"

"You didn't ask if I'd race it." Come on. I've never had a speeding ticket in my life. Do I look like a speed demon?

I love watching "Top Gear," the BBC version, for the witty banter, not for the cars. I couldn't tell you what car they featured even in the middle of an episode. Still, I am delighted that they reinforced one of my very few brand loyalties.

I love Volkswagens. I have never seen them experience VW failure on Top Gear. In fact, when they did one of their endurance races, every time they got stuck in a bog, or a desert, or on a hillside, what came chugging along to pick up the stranded driver? A VW. There they'd be, sweating and cursing, with the hood up, or digging the tires out of the muck, and I'd hear the familiar sound, and the VW would come over the hill or around the bend, even in the middle of the South American desert. Delightful.

I'm not quite sure why, but lately these instances of me being just out of synch seem to be piling up and causing me stress. People seem to expect me to slap my forehead, say, "I've gotta get with the program!" and suddenly covet designer bags and sports cars. I just can't do that. I'd feel ridiculous. And it would be silly, superficial and shallow. So, I expect people to not make a federal case out of it and just be OK with my NOT being superficial.

Don't ask me how that's going. You don't want to get me started.

Louis Who?

I do not understand designer purses. Truth be told, I don't understand designer anything, but purses seem particularly ridiculous. It's a bag. Its basic function could be performed by a grocery sack.

I never want to spend more than $10 on a purse, so I'm constantly disappointed. I only own one at a time - I cannot imagine a scenario that would induce me to switch my stuff from bag to bag. Somewhere, I own one of those "evening bags" that's just big enough for my keys, ID and Chapstick, but I don't know where it is and can't remember the last time I used it.

Recently, I carried a white canvas purse with blue Mickey and Minnie Mouse print and blue sequins on the handles. I got it on clearance for about $4 at the Disney Store, and I loved it. I never thought it was odd, but I guess other people did. One woman said to me, "I just knew you could pull off carrying something like that!" I still don't know if she was being sarcastic or not. I wasn't about to ask.

At my Rotary club one night, I was in charge of an evening of Dr. Seuss, with elementary school students reading to us. I'd left my stuff to mark my place, as usual, but needed to move to another table so I could make room for a guest to sit by one of our readers. As I bundled up my stuff, a tablemate asked, "Do you have permission to move that?"

"It's my stuff," I replied. My friend looked confused and said, "Oh. I thought it belonged to one of the kids." Um, nope - just mid forties me. He was puzzled. I was puzzled.

I finally replaced it (with a boring black purse) when the sequins started to fall off the handles. It's difficult enough trying to figure out the intricacies of human interaction without having to worry about whether or not my bag is business-suitable. I generally wouldn't worry, or even necessarily notice, if my attorney was in sweats, because his brain, ability, education and talent are still the same, but I keep hearing in my head things like the criticism leveled at the photographer for a wedding I attended - "I should have known the photos would be terrible when he showed up in those shoes."

I do not understand the concept of acessories (or clothing) as a status symbol. I honestly do not understand status symbols, period. I can grasp that in some circles such judgements are held to be deeply important, but I keep finding myself thinking, "Really? You honestly think there is some real kind of value or information attached to this?" You'd have an easier time convincing me of the accuracy of reading tea leaves.

My middle daughter's first job was at a fabric store. She's still better with a sewing machine than I am. She made most of the gifts she gave that year, and she made herself several pajama pants and blankets.

She had leftover flannel, blue with little penguins on it, from one of her pairs of pajamas. She decided to make herself a purse, an over the shoulder bag that was roomier than the purse she'd been carrying. I thought it was darling. She was happy. I didn't think much more about it. Then - cue the dramatic music - we went to southern California.

My daughter carried the purse through the amusement parks we visited. It was large enough to hold water bottles or souvenirs, which is nice. It didn't occur to me that it was different in any way from anyone else's purse, except that I think it's cool when people make things themselves. Then we rode a public shuttle.

One young, blonde, tanned female Californian sat near my daughter, glanced down at her purse, and visibly recoiled. She scooted as far away as she could and continued to stare at it, as though it was a rattlesnake and might strike. When we stood up to leave the shuttle, she clung to her boyfriend/husband and kept glancing back at the purse, obviously fearing that simply standing near it would somehow infect her. I am not trying to be colorful here - if anything, this is downplaying her obvious horror. As we hit the sidewalk, she shoved her significant other ahead and kept glancing back at the bag, as if she feared that it would follow her, bite her, and turn her into one of its kind forever.

This stands out all the more for me because I had an unusual experience on the same trip that left me thinking that Angelenos were remarkably blase'.

I had a severe allergic reaction to something. About eight o'clock at night, I felt something that could have been sand blowing into my eye. I went to the restroom and rinsed it out, but it didn't help. I rinsed it again, I dabbed it with a wet washcloth, but it still felt irritated. By bedtime, it was running like a faucet. I kept having to turn my pillow over all night long, in an effort to avoid the puddle under my face. By morning, my eye was swollen shut, and half of my face was huge and puffy, swollen beyond recognition. My pillow was soaked. When I pried my eye open, it was blood red. When closed, it looked like my eyeball had been replaced by a baseball or a citrus fruit. It was time to see a doctor.

This was, unfortunately, not the first (or last) time I'd need a doctor while on vacation. I knew how to find urgent care. The hotel informed me that the nearest facility that would accept walk-in tourists was just down the street at the hospital ER. I left my family swimming in the pool and walked down to the hospital.

I walked in the front door and the perky man behind the desk looked up and smiled. "Are you here to visit someone?" he asked.

I stared at him, trying to grasp this. Half my face was red and hugely swollen - I was walking around looking like a weepy John Merrick, mopping at the fluid leaking from my closed eye socket. For all he knew, I could be hugely contagious. I mean, I understand that you don't want health care professionals to be reactionary and panicky, but really, did it look like it was a good idea to let me loose on whatever ward to which I requested directions?

I decided to go with understated and factual. "No. I am in need of medical care."

"OK!" Mr. Perky said. "What seems to be the problem?"

I was dying to say, "I think my leg is broken." What does it LOOK like my problem is?

"My eye is swollen shut and weepy. The whole right side of my face is swollen."

"OK, you want the ER. It's around the corner to the left." Still smiling.

So, off to the ER I went. I was again asked, "So what brings you here today?" Could it be third degree burns, or a gash that needed stitching? Maybe it's rabies. I mean, GEEZ.

When I got in to see the doctor, I was prepared for the level of disconnect going on. After I explained, AGAIN, the doctor asked for more details and pried my eye open. "Do you think an insect might have stung you?"

"ON MY EYEBALL?"

"Yes."

Of course. "Wouldn't I have noticed?"

"Not necessarily."

He diagnosed it as an acute allergic reaction, cause unknown, and wrote me a prescription, delivered with directions to a pharmacy. So I wandered into Target, feeling ridiculous and conspicuous. Not a single person batted an eye. Not one - old, young, chic, tattered - NO ONE. I understand that people in huge urban areas have seen stuff that would make my hair curl, but I would have thought that the appearance of illness that could be contagious would cause some wariness. Maybe looking supremely unattractive in the land of starlets and rampant cosmetic surgery would raise eyebrows. Nope. I could have been rash covered and in a thong and no one would have given me a second glance.

But an unfashionable purse - now THAT was cause for alarm.

File this under Exhibit 3,498: Why I Could Never Happily Live in the Los Angeles Area.