As we prepare to live in the United States for the first time in our married lives, Kyle and I talk constantly about what it might be like, both the good and the bad.
“How will we find a doctor down there? How much will healthcare cost?? How will we ever make it???”
“Think of all the places we’ll be able to eat out! It’s going to be amazing.”
“Unless we don’t find a good employment situation once we get there. Then we’ll never have enough money to try any of them. And we will be living on Ramen indefinitely.”
“But online shopping!”
It’s that last one that gets us both riled up the most. Online shopping exists in Canada, but it’s kind of a pain. I don’t know if it’s just because the population is so small up here, or because customs is such a hassle, but for whatever reason, a lot of online retailers don’t ship to Canada 🇨🇦. And the ones that do almost never offer shipping free, and certainly not overnight. And Amazon is not the same up here—different (worse) selection, and more expensive at that. Online shopping in Canada is not the ubiquitous one-click free-for-all that it is in the good ol’ USA.
I moved away in 2007, and I feel like online shopping wasn’t quite as extreme back then as it is today. (And let’s be homest, I never had enough money to do much shopping of any kind until I married my sugar daddy, which actually is as depressing as it sounds.) So I really haven’t ever experienced online shopping in all its American greatness. Milk delivered to your door? Never feel frantic because you’re down to the last roll of toilet paper? Order a last minute birthday present at midnight and wake up to it on your doorstep, gift wrapped and ready to go?!
Amazing.
Suffice it to say, we’ve been looking forward to online shopping ‘murica style.
But after reading this article by Carly Knobloch (love her website, so handy and lovely to boot!) I’m a bit hesitant to take it up. After all, my ultimate goal in life right now is to become a minimalist (oh, have I not shared that with you yet? It’s coming), and it does seem like the effortless click-of-a-button shopping I crave might make it easier than ever to fall into the trap of impulse buys. Just today I walked into Costco with two items on my list (mini cucumbers and cheese strings), and walked out with an advent calendar (Lindt chocolates, tell me you wouldn’t have passed that up either!), turkey pepperoni, canadian bacon, and sparkling apple pomegranate juice (those sample pushers guilted me and I did partake). I’m a terrible self-manager…do I really need to make wasting money even easier on myself?
Probably not.
So my new plan is to tread carefully with my e-cart through the online shopping world. I think I’ll commit to buying only the least thrilling items online: reams of paper, ink cartridges, kombucha scobies. You know, the real snoozers. That way I can condition my heart (or decondition it, as it were) not to leap with a surge of consumerist joy every time I see a little brown box show up on my doorstep. I mean, how carried away can I get with a scoby, y’know?
And then if I’m able to control myself after a year or so, I might graduate to Items of Great Convenience, but force myself to purchase only the necessities.
Is that reasonable? Am I setting myself up for failure? What do all you American online shoppers do with such freedoms; do you find yourself overspending online?
Help a sister out.
photo credit: Lynn Friedman High Speed Shopping Past Cal Mart Baking Aisle via photopin (license)
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