Instagram made me do it!!

Anyone else here a window shopper? Do you scroll through Instagram hovering over that teasing ‘click here’, ‘see more’, ‘shop now’ as excited as a ‘no sugar generation’ child stuffing their face with candy floss?

I do. And minutes later as the basket is bursting under my gaze and checkout is clicks away with the promise of a visit from the postman, or Hermes, or DHL, or Yodel (do they even exist anymore?), FedEx or UPS. You get the gist. I imagine opening the door, bringing the parcel upstairs and trying on the shoes, trousers, dress, t-shirt etc. I have run through the whole buying, trying and return process in my head and it is in those moments between checkout and pay now that I realise I don’t need or want any of these items (except maybe the Anthropologie velvet trousers I spied this evening. Oh and the thing a mi jiggy mixer and Eiffel tower cookie cutter - that was a close one).

This happens to me every day, twice a day. I am caught in the glare of the glossy new things that I see in those perfectly formed squares. Earlier today, before the Anthropologie magical shop I became obsessed with a silk t-shirt that had just come back into stock. The thought of white silky t-shirts made me think of Spanish holidays in the sun. And then I had a memory of the tomato sauce that had made its way on to my dark dress at lunch and remembered the reason white clothes and I stopped being friends.

Don’t think that there aren’t any purchases that haven’t made it all the way through the checkout process. There are many. From the time I bought saw an influencer wearing a pair of bright pink boots and I decided I wanted a pair. The ones she wore had sold out, but there were a similar pair (ok, that might be a stretch) of metallic pink ankle boots from Zara. I returned the boots the moment I collected them from store. I mean straight away. I collected the boots, walked away from the counter, opened the box and marched them right back. I am not a pink boot woman and certainly not these boots that looked like I should have been part of a circus troop (not that there is anything wrong with being part of a circle troop, but it is not something I could ever pull off).

Another influencer in Australia was wearing a very chic hat in winter. It was summer here and this was the time I had decided I was sick of carrying around umbrellas in this endless pool of piddly rain that is London, so I bought a hat from Forever 21. Said hat never arrived. I’m still not sure if I’m disappointed or not by that. I am thankful though that I didn’t have the hat in the summer. I would have worn it because you have to wear all new things (I’m sure I saw a rule about it somewhere) and since it was a steamy summer I may have melted and looked ridiculous.

Two items that made their way past the checkout and through my front door this Christmas were from a targeted ad. The first item caught my eye. Dazzled it and made it swing around as if we were some spectacular romantic couple. A lipstick red swing dress with a deep v framed with cream faux fur. I imagined myself wearing it over the Christmas period in place of the parties that had all been cancelled due to COVID. The thought of it felt like magic wrapped in a red dress. Then I tried it on. I didn’t look like magic wrapped in a red dress. I looked like Mary Poppins had tried to dress sexy and instead she looked like a paper bag. No really, it wasn’t me. The dress was lovely though.

The second dress, a black button up pencil dress made it all the way into my wardrobe and has been the hit of my at home working life. Admittedly I wear it bare foot and without a scrap of makeup, but it has made my usual attire feel dull and occasionally get pushed out of the line up for this dazzling dress.

Oooh got to go. My fingers are getting wildly itchy. I swear they have a mind of their own. I spy a cotton summer maxi dress that I can imagine dressed with a denim jacket (which I don’t own…yet) and tan leather sandals. Can you imagine it?