Here is Volume 2 of my Blog Series, Too Much Information. Despite the tumblrs I mentioned in the first installation of this series, I’ll also like to thank my friend Krys, for driving me around that night, and Sloane Crosley, whom’s book I am currently reading and am vehemently relating to, as well as am greatly enjoying.
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There was only 15 minutes left before Macy’s was going to close. My friend and I had strategically dispersed in to different sections of the store, each with our own agenda. The Kensie dresses in the Junior’s department wasn’t sufficiently marked down to support this late-night bit of spending needlessly against my already strained budget. With only a few minutes left, the hunt was on. I left the 80% off rack with only an $8 sweater in my hands. I was defeated. My fallback? Shoe department.
I had left my friend in the discounted shoes rack before I left for Juniors. I didn’t offer for her to follow me, because I’m still ashamed of shopping there. I once took a few fashion merchandising classes in college and I know that the Junior’s department is geared for the 14 to 22 crowd. As the year-round polyester prom dresses will lay witness, I am overstepping my demographic. I feel like one of those Asian housewives, whose only claim to be shopping in the Junior’s is that they’re still able to fit the clothing. I’m ashamed.
I found my friend grasping on to some sandals, very nicely heeled. She still needed more time to contemplate her purchase, so I left her again. I traveled a few aisles to where my size was (my friend is petite, and well, I am not) . This is when I saw them— these beautiful, black faux suede flats that reminded me of Audrey Hepburn’s sensible footwear in Funny Face. The fates had further cemented my purchase by adding a hefty discount. Not only were these flats meant to be, they were affordable!
As soon as the lights in Macy’s flickered to signal it’s closing, my friend and I retreated to her car. I immediately took out the flats from their tissue paper wrapping, stripped off my dirty-ass worn-out American Eagle shoes, and tried on my new purchase. Yes, they fit well. I will wear these all the time, I declared.
The next stop was to get some curry from a restaurant aptly called “Curry House.” I put one foot out o the car and was immediately hit with a sharp pain to my achilles’ heel. For once in my life I understood the pain that went with a scene from a horror film. This certain pain came from the scene in Hostel when the blonde guy tries to run away and has his heels are immediately sliced by a fellow with a niche for human flesh. Surely this is how it feels. I got out of the car, trying to make no real actions that will alarm my friend to my discomfort. She’s a nurse. I’ll just suck it up. With few steps to the resturant I was in so much pain. The coarse lining of these flats were scraping against my soft, undamaged heels, and I could now feel the moisture down my foot that comes with the formation of a blister.
I had my old shoes in the new shoe’s box, but I was unwilling to give up, surrender and put those on. These flats were much too beautiful not to be worn! I just need to wear them more and the lining will get “broken in” and they’ll start to feel as heavenly as they look. This became my mantra for the rest of the night.
Every step I took— back to the car with top shell curry in hand, back to my apartment, the walk to my front door— every step was accentuated by the sudden realization that my heel was now the location of a large, friction-made wound (and not even the “good kind” of friction). Never, since playing Morrowind on my PC, did I take that so much pride with such sado-masochism.
I make a habit of playing addicting RPGs on my breaks from home. Through my summer and winter vacations I play The Sims or Morrowind, and generally neglect all relationships I have in real life. I will go on rants to my friends on how I don’t play videogames because of this exact practice, like how an alcoholic won’t participate in harmless social drinking: they know they’re just two steps away from puking. I don’t like the person I become when I play videogames. So for the greater part of the year, I purposely leave my game discs at home to focus on my education. But when it comes down it, as time gets closer to being home, besides getting to spend time with my family and dog, I’m eagerly anticipating playing those RPGs again.
Oh Morrowind, my one guilty pleasure. I like to play Morrowind on God Mode. I go around with my assassin character and sniper people as they leisurely enjoy a stroll around town. When I get caught by a guardsman I either resist arrest or pay them off. It’s a very fulfilling activity, this kind of cheating. It’s like I’m playing Oregon Trail again, caulking my boat over a river just two feet deep, even though a woman tells me it’s not safe. As a lifeless body floats to the surface, along with the rubble of what was once my belongings, I’m only slightly ticked that I couldn’t prove her wrong. In Morrowind, the same thing applies.
In The Sims 3, I’ve taken things even further. I think the developers were fully aware their game could be used so perversely. Despite blurring the lines of social sensibility (not showering, not using the bathroom in time, not eating, etc.), my Sims are fortified with a cheat code that makes all those worries mute. After “beating the game” (in the sense that I played a game without the help of unlimited money, once) I then go about my hours of play time building up a chosen Sim’s life… only to deliberately break it down. I make my sim have numerous affairs with various townsfolk and, very sloppily (the unwillingness to cover one’s tracks, not sloppy being the act itself), father numerous babies in a number of households. My agenda is to see how far the sim will get being deviant before a lover or neighbor catches him mid-act. My sim is then a loser, permanently in the red mood bars. Game over, though no one loses. Especially not me. I let out a gutty laugh and start over. My town now ever so heavily populated and ready for another social outcast. It’s a very fun game to play. Seriously worth the $60 price tag for the countless hours of harmless sadistic pleasure it can bring.
I wore the faux suede flats to class over the coarse of the next few days. They still hurt, but I still wore them. They are too beautiful. A few more days passed before I had a chance to go to the store and buy band-aids for my heel. Immediately after putting one on my heel, the pain of wearing my flats alleviated. I no longer walked like Golem from Lord of the Rings, nor constantly had a face of “Oh shit! This fucking hurts!” like Kristen Stewart does in all her movies— I was now in tip top shape. I will now need to wear a band-aid on my heel for the duration of those flat’s life, as I plan on wearing them until they fall apart like my American Eagle ones. If I had my way, I’d wear those band-aids on my foot for the rest of my life. Pain is beauty.
