All I wanted was a pair of earrings...what I got was a blog post.

Good evening!

My good friend Dee tells me that I shouldn't write angry, but that I can blog angry if I want to.  I needed to vent to Dee for about 45 minutes today because of what happened.

You all know I LOVE Kohl's department store.  LOVE IT.  If they sold groceries, I truly would never shop anywhere else.  True, I said that about Walmart, but I really do mean it about Kohl's.  I love their clothes, I love their prices, I love their housewares.

I thought I loved their jewelry.

Let me back up.

Yeah, she probably worked with Elsie, too.

This has been a very rough week for me.  Last week Friday Elsie decided she was mad at me for DOING MY JOB and for DOING HER JOB BETTER THAN SHE DOES and she shrieked at me on the phone at the end of the day.  Realizing that for whatever reason, she was never going to get fired, I decided I had enough, and I cleaned out my desk.  I haven't quit my job but to quote Alison, the Basket case from "The Breakfast Club,"   "You never know when you might have to jam."

Rough week at work often translates into a rough week at home, and this week was no exception.  Skippy was dour, Peaches was sour, Hubby was non communicative and I don't know what we are feeding the cats, but the cat boxes have been super foul this week.  Oh, and thanks to my weird schedule and the fact that I felt like crud, I didn't get to Gold's.

So this morning I was feeling very, very low.  And then I realized that I've lost about half my earrings, all my favorites, of course, and that didn't make me all that happy.  I don't have a lot of earrings to begin with, and the ones I have I really do love.

So hubby, being the good guy he is, gave me the Kohl's card and a coupon and told me to get some pretty earrings.

At first it was a great trip to Kohl's.  I was also looking for a pair of semi dressy shorts. I didn't find any, but I found some Capri pants that slim me, and frankly, a slimming pair of Capri's is far better than a pair of shorts.  Besides, at my age and weight group, I shouldn't be revealing that much of my legs.

So I was very excited about myself when I got to the fine jewelry counter.  I was even MORE excited when I got to the counter and saw that everything was 60% off PLUS another 15% because I was there before noon. 

SCORE!

A couple things caught my eye, but they were locked in a case and I couldn't see the price.  I looked for a clerk.  There were two, at the other end of the counter, talking to each other.  I was the only customer at the counter.

The one caught my eye, walked down, looked at me, sniffed, and said, "someone will be with you in a minute."

Um...someone?  How about you?

She left.  No matter, another girl came up, a young thing, named...Sarah.  I pointed to the earrings and said, "May I see those please?"

Now, maybe I don't understand fine jewelry counter etiquette.  But she looked at me like I'd just asked her to strip down and wrestle.  Then she looked very, very bored.  "Which ones?"

"Those, the blue pearls, those...."  I pointed.

She pulled them out and I looked at them.  I thanked her and handed them back.  "How much is the matching necklace?"

"Which one?"

"The one that matches the earrings I just handed you...that one...THAT ONE."

"That's two necklaces sitting together."

She could haven't sounded more bored...but then I'm pretty sure she'd be dead.

"The wiry one."

She pulls out the necklace, I look at it, love it, but am not ready to part with quite that much room on my Kohl's card.  So I thank her, tell her I'll be back and walk around the counter looking at other items. 

I never actually leave the counter.  Never, not once.  I finally find what I really need, some simple good hoops, little hoops to wear with my other gold hoops from Kohl's.  Again, I can't see a price.  I look around for Sarah, who is also not visible.

I finally lean way over the counter and see her kneeling on the floor, HIDING FROM ME.

Yes, you read that right. In a store where everyone is super helpful and cheery, I managed to come across the one department where they hide from customers. 

"Excuse me?"  I say in my most polite voice.

She ignores me.

"EXCUSE ME!"  I say in a far less polite voice.

"Yeah?"

"I'd like to look at these earrings please."

She sighs heavily.  "In a minute."

Now, normally, the wild, loud angry fat woman in me would come raging out.  But it's been a rough week, and I've haven't been well.  So instead, my insecure, nervous, fat girl who thinks she's not worthy of anything makes an appearance and I all but crumble at the humiliation of it all.  This little twenty something in her Dana Buckman (the only reason I know this is because I have the exact outfit in fat girl size at home) suit has crushed me with her witheringly bored sighs.  It was all I could do to stay at the counter and wait for her to stand up, get out her key, unlock the case, and ask "Which ones?"

At that point I knew I didn't dare look at a pair of earrings without buying them.  She had me in her power, and I had to do it so she could be left in peace again.  "I'll take these."  I said in my "I know I'm fat, please sell these pretty things to me anyway" voice.

"You done shopping?"

Well, I wasn't...but then I guess I was.  "Yes,"  I responded meekly.

"You got other stuff?"

"Yes."

She sighed heavily.  "You got a lot of stuff?"

"I have three things, that's all."

Another weary sigh.  "Come to the other side."

While I was making my way around, an older lady walked up to the counter and very nicely asked Sarah if she could look at the sales flier tucked next to the cash register.  Sarah gave the older lady a completely blank face, the kind teens give the elderly when the elderly utter words, and said, "I don't even know if it's a current one, so you can't have it."

The older woman stared at her, shocked at the response.  "Well, I wanted to check something."

"Well," says Sarah, "I'm not giving you this flier, so maybe go up to customer service...they probably have a flier up there."

I was enraged.  How dare this wan little blight of a person talk that way to that nice older lady?

NO COUPON FOR YOU!

Oh, but wait...I still had to pay for my earrings. 

It was sort of like buying soup from the Soup Nazi in Jerry Seinfeld.  (See Skippy, that show is important for something.)  I stepped to the counter, handed her my four things, and then said, "May I use this coupon?"

She looked at it. "This is expired.  So no, you can't"

Now, I've been to Kohl's when they've let people use coupons that are expired, or they've given people coupons, I've had it happen to me.  Not this chick.  She didn't tell me how much I saved...and she didn't ask me to take the survey.  She handed me my receipt.  She didn't even say thank you.

Now, I should have stopped at the customer service counter.  I should have.  But I was in such a mental black out...and you women, you know what I mean. You can't believe someone has just treated you the way you've been treated, and then you think you deserved it for whatever reason.  My mother always felt she had to take it because she was the Principal's wife, and she wasn't dressed nicely enough.  My grandmother felt she had to take it because she was the pastor's wife, and she wasn't dressed nicely enough.

I felt I had to take it because I'm fat.  (I was dressed just fine, thank you.)

I have, by now, broken out of that mental black out, and I know two very important things.

1)  Oh, I will be taking that survey this time.

2)  I may have to stop in at Kohl's tomorrow, "Pretty Woman" style, and inform them that the next time I need to buy earrings, or any jewelry, I'll be going to Walmart.

Granted, not quite the effect Julia Roberts got in "Pretty Woman" but it's a big step for me.