I'm sad..........

[CathyA]

Not sure where this post should go, but it's consumerism that's making me sad.

I live about 20 miles outside a city. DH has his business there. I shop there sometimes, but really try to avoid it much anymore. Today I decided to deal with "civilization" and go to a Meijer store in the city because they were having a good sale on meat. I did several other errands while in the city too. But this one area of this city I think is one of the fastest growing areas in the U.S. It's absolutely nothing like it used to be. The Mayor of this town believes that bigger is better and it shows. I used to travel in this area in the past, and I couldn't even recognize it today. They are even building a huge overpass over the entire area.
Anyhow.........the Meijer store is bigger than a football stadium and they are expanding it. There is roadwork being done everywhere. I had to take a big detour from my house out in the country, because they are putting in a roundabout in the middle of nowhere out here and the road is closed.

While in Meijer, I saw so much CRAP......so many plastic bags.......so many totally needless, ridiculous things in huge numbers on the shelves. On the way home, so many of the old fields/woods were covered with huge subdivisions..with big houses that were only 10' apart from the next house. I finally reached the rural area and low and behold, they were clearing a huge area for another subdivision.

When I'm out in the world like this, I feel like I'm in a crazy funhouse. It's all so bizarre and convoluted to me. I know you're probably going to say "Just don't pay any attention to it."........But I know the bulldozers are headed in this direction. They are developing all the small towns around this city. The farthest one away so far, now has a huge sports complex, to attract people from "all over the world". Now they're talking about shops and restaurants and hotels for all the people who might come there. Then, a little further north of there, a developer has bought about 400 acres of farmland and is developing something similar......I think it's for golf or something.

I feel like I'm living in the wrong universe. When I'm on the computer, I see various things that pop up that I'm supposed to want. A plastic banana slicer. REALLY??? Isn't that what a knife is for?
I'm just feeling really overwhelmed. I feel like I'm a stranger in a strange land. I can't just close my ears and eyes, 'cause I know my way of life might soon be taken away from me.
It feels like we're doing just what we were doing before the last recession.

I'm just sad at what this country has become. How bizarre it all is. :(

[Kestra]

I hear you. There are lots of things I like about living in the middle of the city, but that's about the connections, people, activities, cool old buildings, and interesting parks.

Stores and malls and new sub-divisions are not fun for me. Definite sensory overload in most stores, and sadness in places with no trees where the houses all look the same.

[ctg492]

I understand totally.

[Chicken lady]

I get it "let's move out of the city! Oh no, now we need all the things from the city! Let's build more stores! Oh my, why is the city all empty and derelict?"

When I get grumpy about the "new people" dh reminds me that I am a "new people.". I used to say "but I am a new people who stepped into a shell that was already here.". Now I'm making my "shell" bigger, so I dunno. But I'm cutting down 9 trees out of 14 acres of woods, and you can't see my house from the road.

I hate having to go to town. Even the little towns. I hate when my feed stores one by one become pet boutiques and horse places.

I literally zone out in the mall. My kids have to hold my hand. My son has been responsible for me in the mall since he was 5. He's 21 now. He holds my hand and makes sure I get where I need to go, remember everything we came for, and find the car. The whole family went to the mall at christmastime - I don't remember why, they made me. And I remember standing outside of a store staring at people walking by, and then my son said "guys! We lost mom!" and then he put his arm around my waist, told me to close my eyes, sat me on a bench and said "do not move.". Some time later they all came back for me and dh held my hand all the way to the car.

In August I'm going to have to buy 2 pairs of jeans. I've been dreading it since June.

[Radicchio]

I agree, too. Even as a teenager, when shopping was supposed to be every girl's favorite activity, I couldn't stand it. I would go shopping with friends, but could only tolerate a certain amount of it. The joke was that I would go and watch everyone spend their money but never buy anything for myself. Yes, I was frugal even then, but it wasn't just frugality---after about 20-30 minutes in a mall, I feel completely overwhelmed and just can't deal with all the STUFF!!! Once, after spending a couple weeks out of the country (in an area of Mexico that was very impoverished), I went to the store to buy some toothpaste. It reminded me how exhausting shopping is to me---there are half-a-dozen brands, then at least another half-a-dozen flavors and types in each brand. I want to make a good quality choice for my family, at a good price, but having to wade through all the choices and then go to the next aisle for something else and do it again is simply exhausting. Do people in other countries go to the mall for entertainment the way so many in the U.S. do? It's incomprehensible to me.

[Zoe Girl]

cathy i got it as well. today was shopping day for my program and we always go to walmart, oh dear. i hate it but i like to do a lot of fresh healthy food projects so i need to go. my colleagues were surprised because they teased me when i walked in at 12:55 for a 1:00 checkout and they had already shopped. i was at the register at 1:10. i really can't handle it even though this is a nicer store than most. i find it physically and psychically (sp?) overwhelming to be there. i can't stop thinking that the super cheap plastic crap does not need to exist!

however we are getting our own purchasing cards soon! i can not drive all over, use a grocery store and target instead of walmart. budget so i can afford recycled copy paper and other sustainable items. i will be checked and audited but mostly for making sure the items fall into categories i am allowed to spend in.

[pony mom]

Large stores and malls make me depressed. So many things for sale, and people buying tons of stuff, and I don't want any of it. I'm not tempted and feel rather sad that I wasted my time.

Thrift stores, well, that always a fun adventure.

My old town, which was built up in the 50s, is falling victim to homeowners tearing down the small homes and building larger ones. My mom and I drove down the street where my grandparents and great aunt lived two houses apart; we couldn't find my aunt's house and we were staring right where it had stood. People tore it down and built something that just doesn't belong there. Even the trees I remembered her planting were gone. I always loved her tiny cozy home, as it had character. The new one is just an architecturally interesting box.

[pinkytoe]

Change as quickly as it is happening lately is very unsettling I agree. It feels like the population is just exploding - cars, chaos and people everywhere. Tear-downs are the thing now here instead of remodeling like people used to do. I'm still trying to get used to seeing previous neighbors houses here one day and gone the next. And knowing ours is probably on the chopping block. I'm about ready to move to a teeny town and watch the wallpaper peel.

[Ultralight]

CathyA: I feel the same way you do, or very close. I feel alienated from our insane "culture." This just can't go on forever. It is so unsustainable. I am not being smug or judgmental. I am concerned that there is a collective mental illness that we're observing, that you observed. I fear an eventual collapse. :/

Know that you are not alone in this sadness...

[Simplemind]

I totally agree. I feel fortunate that although within walking distance of town, there is no feel of it around our home. We are surrounded by trees, meadows, flowers and miles of trails with creeks. I feel stress when I see garbage on the side of the roads, abandoned buildings with broken windows, cars left sitting on the roads. Our city had a boom about 20 years ago when they started building ugly cheap apartments everywhere. We had been a relatively small semi farming community until then. Now there seems to be traffic no matter what time of day. Due to the economy there is high unemployment so there are people out and about with short tempers and aggressive behavior in retail establishments. I agree, this kind of living isn't sustainable and people are suffering for it.

[ApatheticNoMore]

I am bummed when I see them fill in vacant areas. This happens on my drive to work. One monstrosity they added first a few apartment condo things and then some vast mess of them not even level, in a truly absurd configuration (like leaning piled on each other). On the plus side the realtor signs get graffiti - always. On the plus side the homeless move in where they want to build. No, no, I really mean that, these are pluses, a homeless person with a tent is living in harmony with the land, far more than the developers. I doubt the homeless will win, but I'm glad they try to occupy :)

I hated shopping as a teenager but it's because I was chunky (never super huge or anything - just chunky). So I was very far from the ideal look in the clothes. In fact it made me feel horrible about myself, like I didn't belong on earth, make one escape into a flight of fancy. But meh, it's just one of those depressing things.

Yea I go to individual stores not malls now, get in and get out before my mood has entirely soured, know with clothes there's a time limit to what I can stand of clothes shopping - tick tock - my weariness grows, but since not a nudist stay for the hour or so I can stand and hopefully get something.

[sweetana3]

Cathy, I know exactly where you are talking about. The whole "C**mel" area is a crazy mess of subdivision hell. (Totally personal opinion.) Some live rural to get away from it and some, like me, live right downtown in the big city to get away from it.

I love a walkable area. No one here tries to pretend we live in the country, although the two chickens next door make it seem like it sometimes. We dont need cars every day for every trip.

[pinkytoe]

I imagine too, Cathy, that since you have your own natural oasis to escape to, that venturing out is even more upsetting than if you lived in the middle of it. You are fortunate indeed. Just think, someday some developer will offer you bazillions for your patch of land:)

[lac]

I love being close to the city and the easy access it allows to the random few things (mostly consumables) that I need.

CathyA, on the positive side, you are well aware and smart about knowing what is a need versus an unnecessary want. If you can venture into the city when it's not so crazy (like during the day), it is so much better. But then you have drivers that drive 20mph under the speed limit. I guess there are trade-off's.

Have an awesome day!!

[Gardenarian]

Oh Cathy, I know exactly what you mean. How can we create and condone such ugliness?

[CathyA]

Thanks everyone. I just wish I knew how to feel better about what's being done to the earth.....and society.

[Miss Cellane]

Somehow, in my small city, they keep finding land to build new houses. Four hundred new houses this year and last. Many on the McMansion side of things. The explanation is that this southern New Hampshire city is now considered within commuting distance of Boston. And there are people who commute to Boston daily from this area. (Many by public transportation, now that we have better bus and train service.)

But it's always a shock when I go down a familiar road and there's a huge chuck of trees missing, and the unmistakable signs that new construction is beginning. This bothers me more than the plastic junk in stores--we are loosing so much land, and trees, and animal habitat to this "need" for huge houses on tiny lots. There are plenty of older houses that just need a bit of rehab to be perfectly fine places to live--and the cost of the house plus renovations would be less than or equal to the cost of the brand new houses, and the older houses are located in the city center, within walking distance to churches, most of the schools, the library, City Hall, the post office, the stores on Main Street, the farmer's market, etc.

There are now houses in this small city that cost over one million dollars. One million dollars. The average cost of a house in this city is about $250,000, so these houses are not being built for the people who already live here. To live in what is basically a small town in a rural area. I have no idea who is buying these houses, or why they are even being built here.

[pinkytoe]

One million dollars
The little bungalow behind us was torn down and replaced with a 5 br, 5 bath house that just listed for $1.1 million. The house literally takes up the entire lot. I guess that is cheap though if you just sold your 3-2 SoCal house for $2 mil. We too wonder where all this money is coming from since most of us around here still have the same jobs and 3% annual raises we've always had. All the edges of the city, ie semi-rural, the cow pastures and farms are being bought up and converted to "planned communities". Part of the issue here is the landed gentry are pushing out long-time residents who then have to move to the edge of town to find affordable housing. I've gotten used to the sound of bulldozers knocking things down.

[Francie]

Boise-area, Idaho. Same things happening. Open "farmland" now McMansions and/or condos. Traffic is getting awful, and we never go to the mall ... and the times we have, it seems there are few people in there anymore. See a lot of "older" mall-walkers, though. They're great for that!