The Black Friday Blues

In honor of Black Friday, here’s one of my all-time favorite posts. It originally appeared as a column in the Nashville Scene.

While most of you were sleeping off a turkey overdose at four a.m. this morning, I was answering my front door.

“We’ve been driving around for an hour,” my father announced loudly as he and my mom bustled inside.

“The clocks in our hotel room were wrong,” my mom added. “But we didn’t realize it until we’d left for your house. We decided to go to a convenience store for coffee, but two men were having a fistfight inside. Can you imagine? We watched them for a while, but they didn’t seem like they’d be done any time soon- so we decided to just skip it.”

“Good call,” I said. “Are you ready?”

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” my mom said.

“Well then,” I said blearily, “Let’s go.”

Across the state at that very moment, thousands of brave souls were heading out to their favorite shopping centers, all in honor of Black Friday, a day when stores open as early as midnight with incredible deals– a day I’d heard about but never had the slightest desire to experience for myself. This year, though, was different.

My mom was in town.

My mother and shopping go together like hairspray and the Country Music Awards. You may remember spending much of your early childhood playing in your backyard or on a nearby playground. My earliest memories of playtime all took place in various ladies boutiques, where I amused myself posing in store windows or hiding inside dress racks while my mom shopped. With her many years of expertise, I knew she would make the perfect Black Friday sidekick.

I had no real plan of attack this morning, just a vague idea that Wal-Mart was the place to be. We pulled into the superstore’s crowded parking lot and made our way inside, where a good hundred people were lined up all the way to the back of the store, each with an empty shopping cart.

“What are y’all waiting for?” my mom asked one young woman.

“All the electronics specials start at five,” she replied. “So everyone’s standing in line to buy them before they run out.”

“What exactly are you trying to get?” my mom wanted to know.

“I have no idea,” she said.

Okay, then. Not willing to stand in line for mystery electronics, Mom and I walked around aimlessly for a while. I remembered seeing a $15 coffeepot in Wal-Mart’s Thanksgiving newspaper insert, so I poked around until I found it. Meanwhile, the clock struck five and electronics began exchanging hands at the front of the store. As I paid for my coffeepot, shoppers headed for the exit, tired but triumphant, their carts laden with televisions, computers, digital cameras and mp3 players. A scary amount of them looked like they’d have trouble buying themselves dinner at Applebees, let alone the 42-inch plasma monitors jutting from their shopping carts. I clutched my coffeepot to my chest, feeling lame. It was time to bust this joint in favor of Paradise.

“Let’s go to Target,” I said.

Once there, we stood shivering in a line that stretched all the way to the end of the building. When the doors opened at 6am, I let the hordes sweep me along to the electronics department, where I found The Goonies on DVD. “Only $3.48!” I crowed smugly, holding it aloft like a trophy while the shoppers around me shouted out digital camera names at a nervous-looking woman behind the counter.

Eventually, I found my mom, who was busy guarding a flat-screen TV/DVD player that jutted from her cart. “I got it!” she said exultantly. “ This is what everyone was going for, Lindsay! Only $199, and it’s regularly $330!” Of course, neither of us wanted it, but I could tell my mom was excited to have scored one of the last ones available.

Eventually, though, we ended up discarding it in Housewares in favor of a ten-dollar sewing machine. “I can’t believe it!” I said, placing it carefully in my cart. “I really need this sewing machine!”

“It won’t work,” my mom said dismissively. “It’s so cheap, it’s not going to work at all.”

“Yes it will,” I said, irritated. “If it didn’t work, they couldn’t sell it, Mom!”

“Well. If you want to spend your money on something like that…” Mom said, trailing off and ending with a pitying look that I knew all too well. Suddenly, I felt like I was 14 again. Geez, I hated it when she did that. But her attention had already wandered to the display beside the sewing machines. “Now this is something else altogether,” she said. “An electric dustbroom for ten dollars! I could use one of these!” She held it out appraisingly. “What do you think?”

“Well,” I sniffed derisively. “I mean, if you want to spend your money on… that… piece of crap….” She looked at me, momentarily surprised, and we both started laughing.

In the end, I bought several bags of junk, while my mom came home with… a headband. That’s right. Three hours of early bird shopping and all the Mall Queen had to show for it was a freaking headband. But maybe that’s what makes her so good. She can see past the crowds and the discounts and realize that she doesn’t need any of it– not as much as she needs that Donna Karan pantsuit currently on sale at Neiman’s, anyway.

And damned if she wasn’t right on the money. My ten-dollar sewing machine?

It doesn’t work at all.
Image via djlicious/Flickr