I am late to the online shopping game.
For most of my twenties, my credit card was in a sorry state of affairs and I did not have the opportunity (or the wisdom) to have credit available to me to shop online.
As such, I did not see the appeal of buying things I likely did not need from the comfort of my own home. I usually waited until the last possible minute, or if there was an event that I needed to attend and my wardrobe was embarrassing, I would run to the nearest store and grab three things, try them on and buy one of them. Clothes shopping, I do not love thee.
Online grocery shopping however, I can get behind that. From the comfort of my home, in my pajamas and drinking coffee, I have completed my grocery shopping for the week. I have bought nothing frivolous and stayed within budget. I will pick up my groceries tomorrow not even having to get out of my car. Convenient and inexpensive.
Quite frankly, I do not enjoy shopping.
Friends of mine can spend hours going from store to store (like actually driving from store to store rather than just hitting the mall and praying for the best) and they enjoy browsing at the racks and looking at stuff. This feels like torture to me. Even while grocery shopping, my shoulders tense and I start to get irritated the second I walk into the store. Perhaps my shopping aversion is a byproduct of trying to shop as fast as humanly possible when carting around two cranky children. Or perhaps I am becoming an agoraphobic crone, avoiding people and crowds, getting angry at "those damn kids." More likely, is that I am busy and I would rather be at home.
I saw an interesting thing a few months ago when I was out and about looking for something specific for our trip. It was an early Sunday morning and I was wandering the aisles in a local pharmacy store and I walked past a young man stocking shelves. He was stocking the product as fast as he could and he looked physically uncomfortable; he was restocking the feminine hygiene products and he was doing a valiant job of trying to ignore the items that he was touching.
I am impressed at his professionalism, even more so because there were two young women, early teens if I had to guess, browsing for the same products standing right beside him. They were debating which product to get, and what brand they preferred.
This scene has stood out in my mind for two reasons: 1) the young women did not care at all that a young man was beside them and they were taking their time browsing and 2) they were not embarrassed at all. I was stunned.
Never in my teenage years would I have been caught dead buying my own feminine hygiene products - that is what a mom is for. Ingrained shame would have had me paralyzed and mortified standing anywhere near that aisle where a cute boy was working.
I am happy that the young women knew that there is nothing to be ashamed of when you are purchasing necessary products. Normalizing the process will help body image and self-esteem issues for the next generations and I hope that this trend continues. In the meantime, there is always shopping online.
For the times that I am shopping in person, at the store, I will be loud and proud and throwing pads, tampons and toilet paper into my cart without a care in the world.
Embarrassment fades with age.
