Guilt

Guilt

I hear a lot of moms talk about guilt, a lot of fantastic moms who shouldn't feel guilt (and the ones that should feel guilt, don't). I am only a mom to three dogs, two cats, fish...and a husband! So, I assume I have a lot to learn about guilt. In preparation for motherhood to a human that might possibly occur someday, I realized that guilt is not an emotion unfamiliar to me. I feel guilt for all sorts of reasons:

Guilt for eating Sweet Tart Jelly Beans
Guilt for spending $29 instead of $20 at Kohls
Guilt for not picking up the price tag that fell off of a display at Target
Guilt for buying $2.64 worth of coffee grounds when I still had some at home
Guilt for not keeping in touch with my little brother better
Guilt for making plans and then having to cancel
Guilt for going home at lunch
Guilt for staying at work for lunch
Guilt for not giving Felix, Flora, Frisco, Angel or Duke enough attention
Guilt for not being a better cook
Guilt for not being more organized

Guilt...it's everywhere!

Sheesh. So, how do we escape guilt? I don't know.

Last night at Kohls, Dave and I had thirty glorious, wonderful, B-E-A-utiful ‘Kohls bucks’! (I LOVE THAT STORE!) We were going to buy some wall art. It was half off and with our Kohls cash, our out of pocket expense would only be $20. Can I get a whoop-whoop?!?!

Well, our wall art was gone. Boo. Sad face.

Never fear, though! Missy and Dave found other treasures! Of course.

I wanted to spend fifty dollars. My reasoning was that spending fifty dollars would only account for a twenty dollar out of pocket expense and if we spent fifty dollars, we would get ten more ‘Kohls bucks’! It was a win-win situation, I thought!

So, Dave and I got wrapped up in bathroom floor mats. They were on sale. They were luscious, soft, warm and inviting. If you listened closely you could hear the mats whisper, "Go ahead, walk all over me, I dare you!" Oh, how I wanted one for when I exit our shower on dark, cold, damp and dismal mornings!

But, instead, because the guilt started to creep in and because we couldn't find a color that we thought we would like for our bathroom, we bought a floor mat for the guest bathroom. This made much more sense to me and relieved some of the guilt. You see, we were spending our money for YOU not for selfish lil' ol' us! We wanted YOU to have luscious, soft, warm and inviting floor mats that whispered, "Go ahead, walk all over me, I dare you!” And, I would continue to sacrifice my comfort buy exiting our shower on dark, cold, damp and dismal mornings by continuing to step on a tattered, old, cold rug!

This is where the plan begins to crumble, right before my very eyes. We found hand towels at Kohls that beautifully complemented the shower curtain in the guest bathroom. They were on sale, two for five dollars! Whoo-hoo! But, this made our grand total nine dollars more than I wanted to spend! Insert tummy cringe. Said tummy cringe will last all evening. Nine dollars! For Shame! AND, here's the kicker, we didn't get ten dollars in ‘Kohls bucks’! Now, have you ever been in a situation where you saved and saved for something, you wanted it so badly, and when the time finally came for you to rush to the store and get that thing, it was gone? That's how I felt about not getting ten more ‘Kohls bucks’. If I was a kid, someone would've had to buy me an ice cream cone! But, I'm not a kid; so, I picked myself up off the floor and with grace and dignity, Dave and I exited Kohls.

Except, the whole way to the car I contemplated aloud, much to Dave's chagrin, returning one of our purchases so we would not be nine dollars over budget. Yes, I'm a freak...I thought you knew that by now!

In my defense, though, nine dollars is a lot when money is tight! Nine dollars is a Stouffer's Lasagna that we can eat for at least five days! ;)

So, we get home with our nine-dollar-over-budget purchase. (But, in the mean time, thanks to a dear ol' friend, I had a Target gift card. Since I aquired said gift card, I have been scoping out desks. I've been watching the prices of desks like a cat watches a bug right before it pounces! Target had no idea that I was honing in on them! Whaa-haa-haa! (Evil cackle) And, as soon as a computer desk that I liked went on sale, I got it, folks! I scored a desk for our home “office” for $65! WHOOP-WHOOP! That made tummy cringe disappear temporarily!)

OK, back to the story. When we got home we wasted no time in setting up our new purchases in the bathroom. To our disbelief, we saw, right before our very eyes that the new purchase glaringly clashed with the shower curtain. We sat there dumbfounded, staring at our decorating disaster with slack jaws. How could we have been so wrong?! On the up side, the two-for-five-dollar hand towels looked great!

Unfortunately, for you, our future guests, we got the bright idea to move said floor mats to our bathroom...just to see how they would look and, whadayaknow, they looked pretty darn awesome!

Yay for my lovely feet! Yay for comfort! Yay for beauty!

Boo for our guest bathroom! Boo for spending more than I wanted to spend! Boo for the guilt! The guilt of spending money on something we really didn’t need.

Sigh.

Guilt. It's everywhere.

Except for my feet. My feet felt absolutely no guilt this morning when they stepped out of the shower and onto a luscious, soft, warm and inviting floor mat that whispered, "Go ahead, walk all over me, I dare you!”