I’m going to rat myself out. Tell on my bad self. Tattle, like that snotty little kid back in grade school who thought he was the boss of everybody.
Well, I AM the boss of me and I’m here to tell you—I struggled with Shame on Saturday. Big Time.
I have to fess up because we talk about shame so much on this blog—how on earth could I look at myself in the mirror if I acted like it never touched MYlife.
Of course, it does! It’s not on the menu everyday—but more often than I’d like to admit.
What kind of whatever I am (blogger, advice giver, sister, friend, wife, nosey posey) would I be if I kept this to myself?
Now, there are numerous types of shame, many which I’ve experienced and some, by the grace of God, I have not.
This was not registered sex-offender shame, nor was it young divorcee or I wore a penguin costume to work on the wrong day shame.
This was familiar to me. Similar to bathing suit dressing room shame, only different.
Oh yeah, I knew this Shame.
We became intimately acquainted ( it slept with me most nights) during the year or so my store struggled financially—and every year since then it comes around less and less, but there are exceptions.
Trigger situations.
Believe me, I can still recognize Shame even with a different face and better shoes because it continues to wear that same cheap cologne and shit-eating grin.
Let me explain.
I have a ten-year-old car with almost 95,000 miles on it. It is not some piece-of-shit clunker with a bumper held on with masking tape. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had one of those. But this is different. It’s been meticulously maintained by yours truly and it’s one of those German Imports, a classy tank.
I’ve mentioned several, well maybe not several, is several more than three? Okay, then three. I’ve mentioned maybe three times that I wish it had Bluetooth, you know, for my phone. There, I admit to a tinge of Bluetooth envy. But never in a million years did I ever say:
“God, I hate my car, what a colossal piece of shit, I wish it was better, I need a new car!”
So, are we clear?
My current car is perfectly lovely. I could even go out on a limb and say it would be a lot of people’s dream car.
Shame. Oof. I can smell its strong cologne already.
Being that my car was getting close to having one hundred thousand miles on it, my husband, the car guy, gear head numero uno, began to ask me what car I thought I’d like next. My answer most times was: the Same car just newer I guess. The other times I told him I was perfectly happy with my existing car.
“What color would you get IF you were to get a new car?” he baited me.
“Blue, dark blue with tan interior.”
I chose that combination mostly because it is almost impossible to find. It would take him months and months to come up with a car in that combination.
I kept the New Car Shame at bay—or so I thought.
Thursday he emailed me a car at a local dealership fitting that exact description.
Shit.
“Let’s go check it out on Saturday” he suggested.
That is my husband’s ideal day. Vehicle shopping. Add a steak dinner and a nice bottle of wine to that and he could die a happy man.
I loath shopping for a car, besides, I really thought the one I was driving was just fine, Thank you very much.
But my mouth overrode my brain—it does that a lot. “Okay,” I agreed.
Now you’re all thinking oh, boo-hoo, he wants to buy you a nice new car. Where’s the problem? Quit your whining!
Well, that’s what I told myself all the way down to the dealership. But as we all know, logic and reason are no match for Shame.
Shame kicks their asses every damn time.
After we looked at it and I sat in it and even gave it a test spin, my husband eyeballed me with that “Let’s take it” look I know so well.
I froze. I stammered and stuttered, staring off into space, my eyes spinning in their sockets and I’m sure it appeared to the gregarious salesman as if I’d suddenly suffered a stroke.
“Can you give us a few minutes,” my husband asked after he observed my bizarre behavior, sending the salesman back into the showroom to stew in suspense.
I could feel the hot river of shame burn in my veins as it replaced all the blood in my body.
I observed it. I named it. I even cursed it. Well, duh!
I wanted to shout I’m feeling Ashamed! at the top of my lungs so it would crawl out of the shadows and dissipate.
That’s what happens when you acknowledge Shame. It leaves. I can only exist if it’s kept a secret.
But it had inhabited me so completely at that point I could barely gather my thoughts. A sinister voice had taken over the Pollyanna Land that normally resides inside my brain, spoon-feeding me well-disguised bullshit.
It was a sickening, sad, and sorry case of New Car Shame.
Now, I could get lost in the minutia of this moment and how horrible it all felt. I could do that. It’s kinda what I do. How my right eyelid was twitching compulsively and it suddenly felt like all the saliva had left my mouth. How everything went into slow-motion, like walking through deep water on stilts.
What? I think he’s talking to me. What’s he saying?
“What’s wrong with you? Isn’t this what you want?” he asked, not used to seeing me frozen and silent.
This man is a good man.
He is incredibly generous with me. Probably too generous. (See there it is).
Here’s what I SAID—out loud—remember? No more secrets.
“I don’t currently have a job that brings in any money. I don’t pull my own weight. At the moment, our relationship is financially lopsided and unbalanced. You are literally supporting me—for now. ( I always have to add that). Who am I to have a new car? Such a nice new car? (the rabbit hole was in sight). This is all making me extremely uncomfortable. Why are we doing this? Why are YOU doing this?”
Now, here’s what I was THINKING—thanks to that piece of shit, Shame:
You shouldn’t reward me for not working. You don’t gift an unemployed writer a snazzy new car. That comes later. Let me PROVE my worth. Let me drive my existing car into the ground. Let me wait until the bumper is held on by masking tape. I don’t deserve a new car. Not one so nice. Not This car. Especially not this car.
That is a veritable Molotov cocktail of Shame. And I was throwing it back like a barfly.
So there. I’m ratting myself out. I went there, to that dark place of unworthiness. I was So freaking ashamed of myself.
“You are the hardest working unemployed person I know”, he said looking me straight in the eye which was made difficult by the fact that mine were spinning and I had started to wander, walking in circles to clear my head.
“You have manufactured a writing career out of thin air, which you work tirelessly on EVERYDAY. That has not gone unnoticed by me.”
He was right goddammit! I have so many irons in the fire these days that my fire is full. You couldn’t squeeze another iron in that fire if you tried.
“And explain to me what in God’s name any of this has to do with a car. You need a new car for MY peace of mind.”
Shame triggers. They make no sense.
They are ridiculous and if you try to sidestep them like I did, YOU look ridiculous.
So there you have it—my story of New Car Shame, and how it ALMOST won. I have named it so many times and now I’ve written about it so it must skulk away, back into the shadows, preferably back to hell— because it is my wish to be free.
Do you have a Shame story to share?
Carry on,
xox
