I Tried to Shop Away My Sadness. It Backfired

It was a Saturday and I had no set plans, which as a single mom and a widow, is daunting enough in itself. Swaths of free time tend to wrap around my head and heart like tule fabric; promising in theory and overwhelming in execution.

To make matters worse, I was on a deadline to clear out an area of a storage tent in my driveway, which my landlord had informed me was no longer available for me to store stuff in. He actually said it was never a part of the rental agreement, but since I never got a rental agreement (four and a half years ago), I didn’t know. The rental process included my late husband talking to said landlord, a long-time friend of his, until a reasonable-for-this-town bro-deal amount of money was agreed upon, and the space was ours.

Matt had always been a buffer between myself and the sometimes unpredictable nature of the landlord. Matt knew him well, and knew when he was in the right mood to ask him for something, to report a needed repair, and to negotiate things like storage space. In the first two and a half years of living here, anything landlord-related was reliably husband territory, and I felt queenly taken care of.

I was now not only alone to deal with the stuff, the landlord, the negotiating, etc; but also felt the security of the  bro-deal tremble each time something like this came up. If the landlord can change his mind about that storage space, could he suddenly change his mind about our bro deal? My home feels lonely and vulnerable, at the mercy of someone else. Perhaps also, it’s like a form of PTSD … after experiencing such a traumatic and profound change that was completely out of my control when my husband died, any little change since has carried an aftershock of insecurity.

Most of the pile of stuff in the white storage tent in the driveway was Matt’s. About two weeks after he died, someone had gifted me the service of a housecleaner. A welcome gift! (Do it for grieving families! And new families!) In preparation for the cleaning service, I had hurriedly shoved away Matt’s coats, socks, and other random clothing items in some duffle bags that he had had for years. I quickly reorganized my storage system to reduce clutter and give the cleaning service a chance to do the most with the space available. The clearing out Matt’s stuff from the house had happened quickly. Some of the nice clothing items I had been able to donate, but the socks had not gone far, lying in wait for their next step, in the white tent, in the driveway.

The stuff wasn’t in great enough shape to keep for Jack, but also not trashed enough to just throw away. Or maybe my emotional attachment was clouding my judgement and it was just trash. I could not be the one to decide. And yet here I was, having to decide something. On my landlord’s timeline, not mine. I resented the whole thing. As I tossed the bags into the back of my van, I steeled against nostalgia, but it didn’t work.

I drove down the hill away from home, fighting back tears as I thought about how those socks had seemed to end up all over the house, before Matt died. Nothing special, white or black trouser socks, but I would find them behind the couch, in the bathroom, under the bed; everywhere. Shortly after we moved in together, I had made a basket for him, for his socks and boxers. I prided myself in helping him organize; it was not his strong suit. It felt like a sweet and simple way to take care of him when I would pick up the sock and tuck it into his basket, or put our clean laundry away. I don’t think I ever resented him for that. I hated when he would put things back in the kitchen in a different spot every time. But there was something endearing about those socks.

So, this Saturday, with my hours of unstructured time, I finally loaded up those duffle bags and tried to donate the stuff to the Santa Barbara Rescue Mission, where Matt did his residential recovery program. They are under renovation, though, and didn’t accept them. I thought about giving the bags to a homeless person, but they were dusty and I didn’t remember exactly what was in each bag, and I didn’t want to burden a person with my giveaways if it was indeed just junk.

My desperate attempt to pass something on, to have Matt’s possessions mean something to more than just me, was at risk of taking up my whole Saturday, and was clouding my decision-making. I imagined myself driving around town for hours, trying to decide where these items would make the most impact. Was I doing enough to keep his memory alive? Writing is helping, but I miss his community… he was legendary in my life; how do I most deeply make that legend live on?? Who would benefit most from wearing these socks?!

These were the thoughts in my head as I pulled out of the Rescue Mission driveway, disappointed that I couldn’t just drop the stuff easily, and tell myself the story that it would change the lives of some homeless folks. I glanced back to the plain buildings that housed the rooms of recovery. It was in their cafeteria, where I had first met Matt, the day before Thanksgiving five years ago, at the dinner for the homeless. He said he had seen me walk across that very driveway, entering the cafeteria from our volunteer training session just before.

He said I had looked like an angel. Don’t go too deep, my mind quickly warned, staving off the gathering tears. I had a car to drive, a son to care for, and shit to put… somewhere.

It was in that moment that I quickly, simply and silently asked Matt where I should bring his stuff. There wasn’t too much weight on it, but perhaps just a little. Ok dude, my ‘tude said, you left me with all your socks and shit. Help me figure out where to dump it. GoodWill immediately came to mind. I was both reluctant and relieved, knowing I would just be able to drop it off and someone else would be able to decide if it was trash or treasure. But I also thought that perhaps that put some of the stuff at risk of going to the dumpster. I just couldn’t manage the minutiae of deciding. So, to GoodWill, it was.

The parking lot was packed; people bringing end of year donations and whatnot. I parked across the street, and Jack helped me load my little Costco wagon with the stuff from the back of my van, pull the wagon across the street, and drop off the bags.

I was afraid she wouldn’t take them when I wheeled the laden wagon up to the GoodWill employee. They were dusty and dingy. But she didn’t look twice, and said, “Put it anywhere.” Relieved, burdened, grieving, mothering, and being a human, all balled up into one frantic moment of tossing the bags in and walking away. The only thing I noticed was how unremarkable they instantly were, amidst the pile of indiscernible junk.

As I walked across the GoodWill parking lot back to my car, I said a little prayer to Matt, asking that he make sure the stuff goes to the right place. Actually, I think I was asking for forgiveness, that I had to rushedly and somewhat carelessly toss his stuff impersonally in a bin of other peoples’ throw-aways. I worked so hard to be so intentional with each step of the process of letting go and grieving his loss… this was uncharacteristically unceremonial, and it was disconcerting.

I wasn’t even able to register until later that Jack was helping give away his father’s memorabilia. I didn’t tell Jack at the moment that that was what was happening. Should I have? I wondered later. Did I miss an opportunity to include him, that could have been meaningful? I was functioning on autopilot; just do the thing and move on. Looking back, I feel like I missed out on a chance to share an experience of giving, and appreciating the spirit of his dad, that could have been a bonding moment.

But I had stuff to do that day, so back in the car we climbed, and headed out.

I drove directly to a grocery store and bought the basics on the list, as well as a few impulses, like Strauss Creamery eggnog, for $5.99 a quart. It’s my third quart in the last month. I put it in my coffee. And sip it directly from the container whenever I pass the fridge. A moment of sweetness in the bitterness of this phase of my life. I’m not yet spending too much time worrying about how that eggnog will appear on my waist. Give it time. And maybe another quart.

Then I went to Costco and somehow spent almost $300. Aside from renewing my membership to go buy more shit, and a four-set of metal wine tumblers that I suddenly desperately needed for the camping kit I use twice a year, I literally cannot tell you what else I bought. Ok, some eggs and cat food and gluten free flour mix, even though I already have a bag, but it’s winter and I’m going to be baking, and this is a new brand for cheaper, so I’d better get it while they have it and I can shove it in a cabinet and hope to not forget about it when the bag of Pamela’s baking mix runs out.

I felt a little jolt of satisfaction and something like grounding, each item I put in the cart. Like their physical weight was keeping me on this earth, moving me forward, surviving life. I could survive because I had pounds and pounds of gluten free flour, and backup bottles of gummy vitamins, just to have, for when the current almost-new bottles ran out.

After Costco, I convinced poor, tired, snotty three-year-old Jack to go to Sprouts with me - I bribed him with a balloon, imposing my mothering tactics on a poor unsuspecting employee to fetch the promised balloon. I could have let that store stop go, but it was also early enough in the day to make a long afternoon at home feel tedious and lonely. Shopping was an activity… and around other adults, to boot!

After loading my cart up with bubble bath and chili-making ingredients (all on the list!), I got back in the car to head home, realizing that all the space I had made in the car by leaving the stuff at GoodWill was taken up, and then some, by the mindless mania of shopping that had wasted my day.

Jack did, however, get his balloon, and it’s been a source of great entertainment since then. In a couple of days, it will be deflated. And it will soon go in the trash can. Much like the thrill at the moment of purchasing all this stuff that I now was responsible for getting into the house and put away.

Once we got home and unloaded the car, I took deeper stock of what had just happened. Shit was everywhere, and so were my emotions. It was practically dark at 4:30pm, and cold, giving my two-room studio a closed-in feeling. The playmat was covered in trains and cars and clothespin-like balloon clips that somehow became sharks in Jack’s world and are some of his favorite toys right now. Ugh. Clutter everywhere; it felt like static in my brain, all I could think of was how to get rid of it all.

I was irritable, stressed about getting some work tasks done; there was dinner, lofty ideas of making chili, putting shit away, throwing packaging in the recycling bin… and the underlying tension of having given away my husband’s socks, and having shoved those feelings into a shopping bag.

What hit me deeply upon going to bed, finally giving myself a moment of quiet; the first all day, with no stuff, no Facebook, no toddler; was that I literally went directly from giving stuff away to replacing it with more stuff. I thought I wasn’t really a victim of consumerism and marketing; I rarely buy new clothes or wear makeup... But there was something really … ingrained … that shopping would make me feel better after giving away my dead husband’s ratty coats and old socks.

As I write, and make space for these feelings, I see how easy it is to hide behind the “Buy Now” button on Amazon.com… or where ever. I’ve become acutely aware of how clutter in my house sucks my energy, catches my creative flow in its nooks and crannies, and swirls it up with the dust bunnies. It also gets in the way of acknowledging the unrelenting reality of grieving. What would it have been like to slow down and include Jack the whole way through what happened, and then go to the beach and sit in the warm sand with him to let my nervous system regulate? There was nothing I bought that day that I couldn’t have gone another day - or another few weeks - without. Yet holding back the tide of sadness felt safer. But just like in nature, that wall will eventually have to come down.

I’ve joked for a long time that I want to become a minimalist, I just haven’t yet found the time. I am realizing that my mission not only includes getting rid of already-existing clutter, but also not adding any new! My relationship to shopping needs to change.

I realize, with some fear, this means changing my relationship with my feelings. ‘Cause if I don’t, the next time I go clothes shopping when I hit a big emotional surge of grief, I’ll get home and realize my new purchases won’t fit in my closet. Fuck.