GIGI GOES GAGA

SIX MONTHS SANS SHOPPING

After years of resolving to overhaul my life every January 1st, I decided a while back to keep it as general as possible: be grateful and kind, try something new, don't be afraid to fail. Committing to a gym membership only resulted in my checking account seeing more action than I was by the time February rolled around, and I've given up giving up on chocolate. This year, however, I have one resolution -- and it's HUGE.

I will not shop for six months. It's only been six days since the year started and I'm still working out the rules, but so far I've decided that "no shopping" means the following.

What I cannot buy

• Clothes, shoes, lingerie, accessories
• Makeup, fragrance, and other beauty products (incl. hair care)
• Furniture, home accessories, art work
• Gadgets and tech (unless essential for work)
• Books and music
• Pretty things that are non-essential to living (for example: stationery, toys/apparel for my shih tzu Scout, Funko Pop, etc.)

What I can buy

• Food (groceries, restaurants)
• Experiences (for example: travel, visits to museums)
• Health-related items (including toothpaste and floss)
• Plants and gardening supplies - spring falls within the first half of the year and so I made this an exception
• Home cleaning supplies - I can be frugal, but never filthy
• Monthly grooming: hair cut and color, facial, manipedi, and massage appointments - this is part of my DNA, even mom was this way -- and heck, she was at the salon two or three times a week!
• Gifts (preferably belonging to any of the categories in my "can buy" list)

Look: I'm still working out the details. I'm the sort of gal who can easily try to rationalize how an exquisite pair of shoes could be classified under "experiences" -- but I know that would simply be defeating the point of this exercise. So what exactly is the point of this then? To prove to myself that there's very little that I really need and to save for what's more important. I've been asking myself lots of questions.

What if I run out of hair conditioner? I'll need to go through all my samples and use them ALL first before I can buy a bottle.

I love to read and listen to music -- why deprive myself of that? I won't; I'll just borrow books from the library and listen to Spotify.

I lost 15 lbs. and my pants are too loose now -- does this mean I'll look like a stupid boy in the '90s? No, I'll just get them altered (I've decided this is an approved expense).

Oh no, I'm going to lose Sephora VIB Rouge status! Still sad about this, actually, but just think of how much I will save!

For years I've been reading accounts of people who have given up all spending, but I simply can't adopt a Frontier House kind of lifestyle. What finally inspired me was this piece in the New York Times by the writer Ann Patchett, who gave up shopping for an entire year. I've decided to try it for the first half of the year, assess what I gained from the experience, and then keep going if I feel I want or need to. Although this may sound very superficial for some of you, my little endeavor will cause me to make significant changes in my daily life, perhaps even to my psyche.

For most of my life I saw myself as an Ugly Duckling who simply learned how to groom herself. I became interested in fashion and beauty because I saw their transformative powers early on. My dad once heard a fashion designer friend of his say that there was no such thing as an ugly woman, just a stupid one -- and he repeated it to me when I was still a preteen (to this day I don't know if it was merely a casual remark or if he was trying to tell me something). Once I learned how to make the most of my body type and features, I then discovered a desire to surround myself with the prettiest things I could afford. When I first moved out on my own and had very little disposable income, I owned exactly two sets of "grown-up" plates, cutlery, and glassware, plush towels, and soft cotton sheets. I had one cooking pan -- a Calphalon, which I purchased at Conran's Habitat at the Beverly Center. I'm hardly extravagant -- but I like things that are aesthetically pleasing, that smell nice and feel good. But as Astrud Gilberto once sang, "Tell me how long must I keep wanting things, needing things when I have so much?" This stops now.

Now it's time for me to make purchasing decisions that go way beyond what appeals to my senses. In the past six days I've purchased a cable that connects my work laptop to a monitor (for when I work at home), yellow sticky traps for gnats and flying insects (I brought my plants indoors for the winter), and takeout dinner from a nearby Japanese restaurant (a Friday tradition). Each time, before I pulled out my wallet, I asked myself carefully: do I need this? do I have any options that don't involve buying something? Satisfied with the answers -- there wasn't an extra one at work, gnats are gross, and relaxing date nights at home once weekly are hardly unreasonable -- I think I'm off to a good start.

Wish me luck. I'll report back in six months.

 

 

 

BUSTED

My brother-in-law flew into town yesterday and decided to spend the night at our place."Give me 10 minutes," I told him. "I just need to put some stuff away in the (guest) room."

Which really meant that I needed to put shoes back into the closet so we could make room for him. Not an easy task at the moment. Because I'm fastidious about caring for my shoes and would never ever think of tossing my footwear into a heap, boxes are literally spilling out of every nook and cranny . See, each pair goes inside its own box, each labeled with a brief description (brand, style, color). Right now there are five columns of boxes filling half the closet, each about 20 rows high. I need a stepladder just to get to anything on the top rows -- which isn't as much of a problem as how to get to the boxes stacked at the bottom, if you think about it.

Outside the closet door is another five columns of the same, around eight boxes high, which will never join their siblings inside because there's simply no more room for them. If I stack any more, I'll no longer be able to reach the handle and slide open the closet door. Which explains why I had more boxes stacked by the stereo -- which I now had to find room for so that our houseguest wouldn't feel like he was drowning in shoes, or at least think that he was being forced to sleep inside a shoe stockroom.

As I was sitting on the floor gently contemplating my task at hand, trying to use my basic knowledge of high school geometry so that I could figure out how I could fit more boxes into zero space, my husband walked in to see what I was up to. I hate it when he does that, because it never ends up well.

He: What's taking you so long? L's falling asleep on the couch already.

Me: (Mumbles incoherently on purpose.)

He: Do you have more shoes now??? (Slides open the closet door. I hate it when he does that, too, because I know he'll freak out when he sees boxes all the way up to the ceiling. But I can't stop him.) WHY DO YOU HAVE SO MANY???

Me: (Putting on calm, rational face.) I take care of my shoes really well. I have so many pairs that I got way before I even met you and they still look like I just got them yesterday.

He: But why is it that when we moved in here there was enough room for them inside the closet and now there isn't?

Me: (Moment of panicked silence.)

He: Did you take any shoe boxes from the garage? Or from inside the hall closet?

Me: (Taking the Fifth.)

He: I can't believe we're running out of space because of...shoes! (Makes an exasperated sound and then walks away while making grunting noises.)

Hmmm. Maybe he won't notice then if I get these, after all then. I mean, would anyone notice if one more book was added to the New York Public Library? In the meantime I think I need to brush up on my geometry -- because if I don't, my husband may force me to use simple arithmetic and learn how to subtract a pair before I add another.