Consuming

I went to Circuit City last night to buy a digital camcorder; I realized the other day that the last time I taped the kids doing anything was, oh, two years ago. Two years is a big gap in childhood terms. My old videocamera was a retired item when I bought it ten years ago--that's how I could afford it--and it used a cassette tape that fit into nothing. So I can only look at the videos I made on the camera itself--not on the TV, not on the computer. I have to get them transferred to DVDs one of these days.

My folks have one reel-to-reel tape of me and my siblings on an egg hunt when I was about 8. It's like one of those scrappy tapes of Big Foot--glimpses of fleeing bodies and flying hair, with shadowy tape memories of whatever was taped over to make this new recording: none of the clear stares I wish I had at the person I used to be. But with five kids--and no cheap digital options for prints--they sort of lost the yen for documentation by the time I hit 5.

So we walk into Circuit City--shorty and I--and there's this bored teenager working the photo section, and I pass from the uber-pricey aisle over to the B-level section, and settle in on two camcorders from Sony--one in the range I expected to pay, and one about $300 more. The bored teen wanders over. I ask him what the difference is. (Tip: never ask.) "The sound quality on this one ($$$) is far superior to that one ($), and there's just no comparison in the quality of the image."

I'm imagining the quality of images the kids will be working with when they're 40--when they want direct stares at the people they used to be--and how the stuff we make now will seem so sub-par. I want to buy as much quality as I can afford today. But $$$ sits funny in my throat. So I tell him I'm going to wander around and think about it.

Only to wander out of the section I have to pass by the Nikon D40 and D80, and maybe I haven't mentioned to you that my Coolpix880 just doesn't cut it, resolution-wise, anymore. Oh, what I wouldn't give to have a camera like that D80... The resonant click-click--the weight in your hands--the way those cameras make every snapshot a piece of art...

I never shop. Never spend money on stuff. You get trained pretty quickly that way when you have no money, so there's that. But I think I could count on my hand the number of times I've been dying to own something I didn't have. And most of those times were pre-25.

Last night I bought a camera (the D40) and a camcorder ($), and I recognize that had I not bought both I could have bought the D80 or the $$$, but I'm OK with that. I couldn't sleep last night--so excited about my goodies--so eager to get my hands on them this morning. L said, "You know, you SHOULD buy something for yourself now and then, 'cause you never do." And I said, "This is my Christmas present to myself, only I'm getting it early so I can use it at Christmas." He says, "I'm going to get you SUCH a great present at Christmas," and I say, "You know my favorite things are things you make yourself, right?" Except that he's just seen me go wild in the camera store, and there goes my whole position on consumerism, right out the window, clear as day.

(I'm so excited...)