Remember those great Judy Blume young adult books?  I checked out the one about Margaret awaiting her period from the library about a thousand times.  Looking back on that book now, I can so relate to the waiting, the wondering.  Except in my case, it’s not the waiting for my period.  I got that about 26 years ago, and that’s what’s gotten me to the more important waiting I’m doing now.  

I’m waiting–and praying–for the day I can go to Target.  Alone.

When I can, the first thing I’ll do (after I tell all my friends about it and they beg me for all the gory details), is go browse the bra the undies section.  And browse, I will.  I will pluck every single bra off the rack and hold it up to my chest, read its label, and perform a material-feel check, just because I can.  And then I’ll take another hour to try them all on. I will not spend my time there picking up and rehanging forty bras that little hands have strewn along the aisle, or chase small people out from under racks of underwires, or shush little-boy shrieks of, “Mommy, these are for your boobies!”

After I’m done QC-ing all the underthings, I’ll shuffle over to the sunglasses section and try on every pair.  I need a few new ones now because my last two were thrown on the ground at the zoo and run over with the stroller, and stretched out until they snapped in half.  Not by me.

Moving on, I’ll grab a coffee at the food bar without even looking at the snack bag rack and cold juice box display, then head to the media section, where I’ll read every single magazine and newspaper cover-to-cover.  I will read for comprehension and finish every sentence the first time, even if it’s about poor Brit or silly Posh, just because I’m actually reading.  I’ll relish the muted house muzak in the background as opposed to the elevated, “Mommy!  He’s eating my yogurt!” background noise at my house. 

Then, I will go try on clothes.  I might even buy some, since I think the last time I bought anything new was 1963.  Oh wait, I wasn’t born yet.  It just seems like it’s been that long.  Say what you want about a woman who fantasizes about buying clothes at Target; they make good enough stuff and if I can do that in the same store I get my coffee drunk and my reading done, well, good for me.

Of course, I’ll follow all this up with a trip over to women’s shoes, where I will try on several pair and stand very still in them, instead of trying to run in the damn things, tripping over those bloody elastic shoe-attacher bands while chasing cackling little boys up and down the aisles.

On the way out after 8 hours with my overflowing cart(s), I will bypass the toy department (actually, in my ideal Target experience, there would be no toy department), the Pokemon card display, the diaper section, the birthday party aisles, and the toy department (did I already say that?).   

And I will be a good girl, and use my manners, and be nice to my brother.  Please, God?

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