Today, when we imagine futuristic shopping, it’s all about the Internet, but ten years ago, it was catalogs. I still get them every day, for reasons I can’t determine. I never buy from them. I guess the companies bought my name—and the catalogs go straight into the “recycling.” My mailbox eats a small forest every year. I thought it would stop when I got divorced. My ex was a catalog hoarder. She had filed reams of them, alphabetized so that she could order anything in the world without leaving the house. That was one irreconcilable wanted to pick it up and feel it. My present and hopefully future wife is She hated catalogs too. But then it turns out that she loves the convenience of shopping online. As a result, I am on very familiar terms with the UPS guys—I know their life stories. And this advancement in shopping probably doesn’t eat up as many trees. Maybe it uses a lot of gas, because if the item arrives and the lady of the house doesn’t like it or it doesn’t fit, it goes right back by UPS, no questions asked. Is that convenient? What amazes me, though, is when the online ordered groceries are wheeled in on a huge trolley -and I open a dozen corrugated paper boxes. What’s in this giant box? A piece of cheese! This one? A salami! They still
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haven’t figured out how to consolidate, so I’m guessing that you know whose company trucks roll out the future? Don’t get me wrong. I am not against shopping on the Net. It has revolutionized my book buying addiction, perhaps even enabling it. I used to spend countless hours at book fairs browsing and then stagger home with a semi-impossible burden of shopping bags. I still like book fairs, but now I browse in some bookseller’s booth, then go to the smartphone, and I generally find the book I’ve eyeballed, handled and admired priced far less elsewhere: click. Sorry physical bookseller. And I go home with two books. The rest arrives by mail days later. And booksellers are cheap. They rarely overpack anything. Nothing against shopping by app—if it turns you on, but I think the real future of shopping is live and in person. Why? Because I think people really look in the mirror and ask someone if it makes them look fat. They want the experience of the hand! Not to mention to get out of the house. I want to get out of the house too. There’s no room there because of all the books I bought online. When I walk around Manhattan I marvel at all the boutiques. The Lower East Side, Nolita and Brooklyn are filled with amazing new