the Blackest of Fridays

This evening marks the end of the first day of Christmas shopping for the 2010 holiday season. Black Friday is an anomaly indigenous to the US, and for those of my dear readers that don't understand what it means, I will explain it to you the best I can...

On Thanksgiving morning millions of people go to their front porches, local convenience stores and delivery boxes to retrieve the morning paper. It is the biggest addition of the year containing the goodies in print and the hopes and dreams of every mom and dad and child in the form of a bargain and a "contest". The bargains are unbelievable and the contest is to be the earliest and most enduring individual known to mankind, and becomes a testament to all the things wrong with humanity and capitalism. It can also be a testament to love of a child by his or her parent, brother, sister, uncle, aunt, lover, family and friend. I never got into the holiday until some seven years ago and every year I still claim to not want to do it again next year, but it has become my "crank" of choice as it has many others. You cannot pass up the difference between shopping and spending $500 vs shopping and spending $250 and doing it at the wee hours of midnight to 5am...it has become as big a part of Americana as apple pie, the NFL and baseball. So after waking up Wednesday at noon, my normal time, and taking care of online business and things to do and spending time with my kid, I was up on Thanksgiving day morning with the rest of the psychos and ogling the morning paper bought at the 7-11 down the road along with a Slurpee and two muffins. The parade was on and I enjoyed it but not half as much as combing through one advertisement after another in the hopes of providing a Christmas she can remember at a price I can afford. With packing and moving and my health and disability I have to resort to a credit card Christmas based upon where the cards are. I have a Walmart and a Target card and needs of moving expenses and a refrigerator to move into with my brother and know what I can handle budget wise and what I cannot. I sat eagerly deciding and not really too upset or concerned about finances as I looked at Lobo circling her wants with a Sharpie and all the shrewdness and I frugality had passed on to her. I'm proud of what a bargain hunter she has become and even more proud of her compromising skills and debate strategy.

Lobo wanted a PSP, a handheld gaming system, and cited reason personal to her for wanting it that were filled with emotion and quite valid. The problem was the item was expensive and I wasn't sure what I'd be able to afford as it was more important to me that my little buddy had a  new bike so to be able to ride and chaperone her disabled mom when I got my fat ass up on my mountain bike. I had all these ideas of clothes, she didn't get any new ones for the school year and I felt I owed her, and jewelry(every girl never has enough) and various trinkets and figurines and makeup and music to stuff her stocking! She argued and even to the point of tears that she didn't care for any of it and was satisfied and only wanted the PSP...didn't even want the bike but knew I wouldn't bend on that as that was equally important to her and I....Then, she gave up, with a stoic face, and wiped her tears and said "Momma I'm not mad, it's just frustrating and I would rather have nothing and have you than to have all this stuff. I really want it but I know we may not have the money for it."

God, that hurt and still makes me cry as I write her words. Being a single mom with little support has been a struggle and my sister and her twin brother have houses full of kids and I never wanted or will ask them for a hand as with my bro, he's helping enough already filling in as a dad to my kid and giving us our new home. My sister lives meagerly and had her own hopes and dreams for Black Friday. So I took a little nap after my shower for an hour and got up at 3pm and got dressed conservatively and drove to dinner with her. We talked about our game plan and I didn't want her to go with me as I have done this before and felt she would be terrified but she was so worried about me being by myself and refused to accept my firm NO. She's heard my horror stories year after year for the last six of them. After dinner we went to my brother's and talked and stayed up till 11pm and then went to the first store. We were an hour early but there wasn't a parking space to be had and I drove around in circles waiting for someone to come out and open one up for me. We went in to a horde of equally hopeful moms and dads and with the confidence of the ignorant(yes, I have my momos), went to the back of the store to find the gaming system, that wasn't on sale for the holiday, was out of stock. I was mortified. The games was 40$ off it's original price and had bonus items in the form of a memory card and a movie and a game disk saving you $100 off of a $230 price tag when all said and done. I left my soon to be 15yr old to wait by the case for the manager while I went to go grab her cycle as the store was too crowded to even push a cart around and being just four aisles over never really was a concern. But, where I was with her was in the middle of the toy marathon section and at the stroke of midnight, the manager came over the speakers announcing Black Friday had begun and people started screaming and 3 parents got into a punch out over a big wheels electric car and all hell broke loose as normal ignorant humans turned to rabid jackals ripping things from each others hands and tugging on clothes and pushing an shoving.

The scene unfolded in a few seconds and I panicked and ran to get my kid and made sure she was safe and left, without her game and bike, disheartened. I have seen people behave this way during food shortages and even felt pity as the need was there but could find no need to behave like this over a toy or a sweater or a movie. Lobo's look was mortification and I had to get her out of there and we both were in a state of shock and gave up knowing that no matter what we were going to try again, and may not succeed but at least know we had tried. The next Walmart we got to had both her bike and seconds later with my lovely babe screaming and running down the bike aisle while I sat there stunned and proud at having at least been able to get her bike came barreling down to momma hugging her game console and crying and bursting into tears further when she saw the bike too. One gift she wanted and two she got(and then some with the money saved)and I have never seen her more peaceful and angelic and helpful in my life. Now she was all in and wanted to go to another store and get me some things she knew I was admiring. We were tired, hungry as we hadn't ate since 4pm and it was now 4am Friday morn and all was a blur from one store to the next each carefully mapped out in order of when they open with the last being the necessity, the fridge to save a $1000 of groceries from the casualty list of moving, we headed to Home Depot. I met a wonderful man there and everything was blissful and calm seeing as all the big daddies were playing tackle positions at Toys R Us and other like stores in the hopes of the father of the year award...we know who already got mom of the year(chuckles). I found a perfect small refrigerator within my $600 budget for $398, no tax and no delivery charge(going to be delivered tomorrow at my brothers house for its new home in the garage)and was so full of holiday thankfulness and cheer. I couldn't walk anymore, barely see and not feeling at all well and drove to breakfast then home to fall fast asleep by ten am and stay out until ten pm...I'm achy and sore with a newly broken hand and swollen feet and too much sun exposure, but I feel like a queen. I am in her eyes and will never lose my crown.

At the end of the day, I sit and reflect on those three parents duking it out and the people cutting us off and the store personnel who had to work instead of shop for their families and the waitress who served us at breakfast and the sore feet and headache and inflammation, broken fingers and lost day and think to myself how imperfect my world is and how perfect my love for her is and how well she knows it. I asked her if she would do it again and she exclaimed without hesitation "Only if I'm with you momma and YES I want to-this is cool, scary but cool!"...so, on that note, on the blackest of Fridays, came the hope of the purest of love and the whitest of Christmases~mobe's love to her all and her all to her loves!