If, like me, you live with my wife, you know the pain endured by men married to women whose principal mode of creative expression–apart from adult ballet classes, and I use the term “ballet” advisedly–is interior decoration. If not, let me tell you about it.
There are the twice-a-month visits from the town Fire Marshall to make sure that mail order catalogs are not blocking exits or stairways. There are the sessions with the Department of Youth Services, who examine our sons for signs of neglect. There’s the ASPCA nosing around our house, peering in the windows to make sure that the cats aren’t suffering from malnutrition brought on by excessive spending on throw pillows.
When I think of my wife’s lonely battle against her addiction, and how gallantly she struggles to stay out of stores and home furnishing web sites, I get emotional. She has her bad days, sure, when she comes home with some gaudy objet de l’argent–another pear or rooster to adorn a mantlepiece or end table–but she always picks herself up, dusts herself off and gets right back in the game.
God, how I admire her when she bites her lower lip and is able to say ”Just looking, thanks” as she strolls through some cute little knick-knack shop. “You go, girl!” I want to yell, but I don’t. The shock might set her back and cause her to grab a lamp or an umbrella stand–it’s simply too risky.
Topiary trees: They’re like prunes–one’s not enough, but isn’t twelve too many?
I’ve supported her over the years without whining because I always assumed that her disability was genetic. My mother-in-law has personally pulled the U.S. retail sector out of six recessions in her life, and once caused a credit card point-of-sale terminal to burst into flames, like a NASCAR vehicle spinning out of control heading into the backstretch. That’s what can happen when you constantly push yourself to the limit, the way the pros do.
“These guys live to break the limits!”
But recently I picked up the latest offering from a home furnishing company that seems to crank out a new catalog twice a week. As I flipped through the pages loaded with Parsons chairs, Napoleon clocks and topiary trees, my eye was drawn to little balloon-encapsuled “suggestions” lurking in the margins, pointing to particular pricey items.
“Mirrors open up a room!” said one. “This table does double-duty as a console!” said another. “These bottles look so authentic they fool everyone–honest!” We may be in a recession, but exclamation point wholesalers seem to be doing okay.
“Ungh–botanical prints!”
I thought back over our recent dinners together. I had heard these phrases before, uttered by my wife in a sing-song monotone as she stared blankly at me. She’d been brainwashed! She’d turned into a home decorating zombie, and I’d been too busy with work to notice.
Vance Packard
It was those damn “hints” and “suggestions” and “tips” for chairs and consoles and credenzas that did double, sometimes triple duty, like a throwback football player who plays both ways and dropkicks field goals. The formerly reserved world of home decorating had become just another arena in which “hidden persuaders”–the term was coined by sociologist Vance Packard–had worked their hypnotic effect on an innocent, gullible woman. Why not throw in “New and improved!” or “Extra cleaning power!” as well, as if an Italian console and side table were no better than a box of detergent.
It’s enough to make a man weep, but I won’t–I won’t let them do that to me! I’ve got to save my tears.
For the end of the month, when I open up the credit card bill.
Available in Kindle format on amazon.com as part of the collection “The Difference Between Men and Women.”