Consumerism: Catch the Feeling!

In other parts of the world, stampedes are pretty much reserved for passion-inspiring subjects like soccer and religious pilgrimages. In this country, we stampede for post-Thanksgiving bargains. Bostonist doesn’t know who fares better in that comparison (being not especially enamored of soccer, religion, or shopping), but we generally start to feel a little disgusted as the holiest day in the retail calendar approaches. This year was no exception, and we swore on Thursday night that we’d avoid buying anything at all on Friday (we even packed our lunch to be sure). But somehow, spending the day in our mostly empty office infused us with such a pleasant, tranquil feeling that we thought, “Since our boss isn’t here anyway, why not break out a little early and go pick up some dress shirts like we’ve been meaning to?” We totally forgot about the retail madness in the air all around the state.

We were rudely awakened from our lazy Friday afternoon reverie as soon as we steered our bicycle onto Washington Street near Downtown Crossing – it was so choked with shopping-bag laden deal-hunters that we had to (gasp) walk the last block to our destination. The weirdest thing, though, was that the buying frenzy was practically contagious. We went into the Eddie Bauer outlet determined only to by wrinkle-resistant dress shirts, and emerged with the shirts plus two pairs of wool socks and some pants, and almost went into more stores before we remembered that Mrs. Bostonist had a 6:00 p.m. engagement that required us to be at home with Toddler Bostonist. And today was worse: We went to the Cambridgeside Galleria just so we could get a space heater from Sears, and ended up with a bag full of stuff of questionable necessity from Old Navy (Bostonist is lowbrow to the core). What the hell is wrong with us? We don’t get caught up in the spirit of anything, and the only thing we even like to buy is food! All we can say, dear readers, is beware. This consumerism business is no joke.

Photo: Toddler Bostonist practices his cart-pushing and bargain-hunting skills.