‘Tis the Season of the Jolly Wanter

She said
they weren’t that expensive
a good price, really,
and so she bought
the teardrop earrings
with her lunch money
because isn’t it true,
that beauty feeds us…
forgetting that last week
she bought the shoes
the week before
the book of poems
and she’s starting
to feel hungry again…

Which is what the Wanter does right after eating. It’s the Hunger that can’t be fed.

I buy a large quantity of gas and ferry fares on my business credit card and I just found out that I had some cash back money to spend for Christmas. I hauled out the old catalogs with the dog eared pages, the glossy magazine photos tucked away in my Someday/Maybe folder. And then I did a dangerous thing: I went shopping. Not to the mall or the carefully bookmarked websites. I went to the recycling store. To look at junk, castoffs, and, the key word here, One-of-a-Kinds. That’s right, exactly what stimulates my Wanter.

We oohed and ahhhed through the primo room with the jewel cased expensive items. I lovingly stroked some brass castors and their companion brass paws. The price was not so bad, only half of my cash reward…I could buy more…

We progressed to the back room, the big warehouse, the drawers full of Smalls, the stacks of perfect patina vertical grained fir, row after row of orphaned cabinets looking for a new home. And then we got to the windows.

“I’ve been thinking,” I said, “about building a display cabinet for my finished books and boxes using an old window for the front of it.” So we pulled out leaded glass beauties and I sighed with longing. I imagined each one as my cabinet door. Then, at the exact same moment, we saw the One: the arched top, leaded glass Queen of recycled windows at a REALLY good price.

More than the cash back reward.
but not too much more.
And I had some cash in my wallet for groceries…

I am amazed at the power of wanting. The way that all logic and resolve and good intentions go out the window.

The holiday season fills our senses with stimuli. From merchandise to gourmet food to happy families gathering around perfectly decorated table settings, we are encouraged to want more. To me, the words “Black Friday” convey a kind of darkness. But for the retailers, it’s the holy celebration: they are finally (they hope) in the black.

This month I started my own back to the black program. So far, it’s a huge success. I haven’t gone deeper into debt and I have started earning more and spending less. And the cash back reward? Well… I’ll be eating simply this week… but isn’t it true that beauty feeds us?