Musings

Tata Cashflow is Bangala

I remember watching Breakfast at Tiffany’s for the first time and wondering if I’d ever feel the same way about a shop. Don’t get me wrong I love Tiffany’s, but I don’t go in there very often for my budget does not stretch to the “Tiffany’s lifestyle” and I don’t believe in credit cards because that's how I was raised. I come from a “cash is king” background and the term “cashflow” is part of the fabric that stitches my childhood quilt together. Every family disaster hinged around the indomitable “cashflow” situation and it became a Hiltermann stock phrase. Some children are raised on God, my father raised me on Cashflow.

I have been into Tiffany’s once… I was wearing an old pair of Converse and a summer dress. I was about as obvious as a teenager in a nightclub; trying to blend in but failing miserably. When I entered I might have actually said something Christian’s would disapprove of. Loudly. The Doorman subtly approached me, said ‘silver’s upstairs love’ and winked. I should have been mortified, but I was grateful. I left with a little turquoise bag and a smile. It was a gift, possibly the best gift I’ve ever given anyone. (At this point alarm bells… yes, ALARM bells, should be going off. ‘best gift to give’, ‘Jaqs doesn’t have anything from Tiffany’s’, Christmas, Jaqs’s Birthday fast approaching… I’m just saying… I don’t ask for a lot… cough cough…) Anyway I’m moving off the subject…

Tiffany’s was a sparkly treasure chest filled with happiness and joy. So lovely, so sparkly, so clean… but would I want to eat breakfast there? Not likely. Would I want to go there every day? Not likely to that too.

There’s a place that resides in cyberland… it has everything and more, and dreams are made there. It’s a veritable jungle of joy. In the highest treetops you can find exotic dvds, rare albums, mystical kitchen utensils. Further down in the lower canopy hide box-sets, cheap printer cartridges, books. In the undergrowth there’s stationary, bedding, toiletries, shoes, tents, Russian Mail Order Brides. Banners advertising the new “Kindle” fly past, soar up into the air… flutter casually… The more you search the more you find, but don’t be careless it’s dangerous out there. ‘One Click’ shopping lurks ready to trap you, ‘Next Day Delivery’ ensnares you, the deadly bite of Internet shopping will course through your veins until you’re infected by the fever. Amazon.com, a whole world of discovery. You’re wondering about my cashflow situation aren’t you?

I remember when I first purchased something on the Internet. It was in the days of dial up connection, so it was a lifetime ago. My mother and I decided that we needed the collector’s edition Scarlet O’Hara Barbie Dolls. Initially we believed we would be satisfied with one of them but secretly we knew that we needed the whole set and wouldn’t sleep until we had them all. We had seen the dolls in America but owing to the “cashflow” situation we could not buy them. They haunted us, like all dolls tend to do. Years later we decided to search for them on the interweb machine and hours later the page had loaded and we were informed that we could enter a bidding war for them. This was risky business in the 90’s but being intrepid children of the postmodern age my mother and I entered credit card details, ID numbers, residential addresses, security passwords and the name of our first pet… and then we sat back and waited. 

In the year 2010 I can sleep easily knowing that I own 4 Scarlett O’Hara Barbie dolls and I have their original boxes. In fact when I received them I watched the movie and surrounded myself with my new treasures. Now there’s a state secret I was not intending to part with!

Personally I cannot believe my faith in online shopping. This was before it became the safe haven that it is today. Don’t get me wrong I’ve had my fair share of buyer’s remorse. The fake Tiffany’s bracelet aka “the bracelet of shame”, the fake Eddie Izzard tickets, the fake Fleetwood Mac ticket… but astoundingly I’ve wasted more of my hard earned cash by shopping in the real world than on the Internet. As a general experience I find that I take more pleasure in Amazon than I do in a shopping mall. I have no crowds, no prams, no screaming kids, no temptation to stop for a cup of expensive cold coffee, no queues, no parking issues, no wondering ‘is this toilet clean’?

The best bit? I get it delivered to my desk and the excitement of tearing through the package and wondering which item has arrived? Well it’s like Christmas. In fact it’s better than Christmas, which is why I also do my Christmas shopping on Amazon.

Being a single woman with very little financial obligations I’ve decided that I would rather not have a credit card. Also I am very obedient and I still have the faith in Cashflow that was drummed into me. As Cashflow dictates I don’t buy anything that I can’t afford, if I don’t have money I don’t have money. It’s a simple financial belief system but it works for me. And I can sleep easy knowing I’m not responsible for that darned “credit card crunch” when all those credit cards went around stealing people’s money. ‘What? That’s not really what happened?’ ‘But some guy in a bar… oh… he was taking the…’

Cashflow equates credit cards to a gambling addiction, and I have had this instilled in me by my father who basically said, ‘by all means get shitfaced on whisky but don’t you dare get yourself into a situation where you have no cashflow’. This has meant that I don’t have a credit rating. What this means is that when Amazon offered me a special credit card I wasn’t allowed it, because of my credit rating, which is probably that of a toddler. Luckily enough I was sweating beads whilst filling out the online application so it’s just as well they didn’t accept it because I would have had a guilt induced pulmonary embolism on the spot. Father’s voice would have boomed, ‘for Cashflow’s sake daughter have I taught you nothing?’

So now I have an Amazon basket FULL of stuff I want but can’t buy and every day it grows like a lion cub that you thought was cute, but is now looking increasingly scary. What have I done? And can someone please just tell me how to get rid of banner ads because if I see that fucking Kindle fly past my screen one more time… I will buy it… Cashflow help me I will buy it…

Amazon… it really is a fucking jungle out there.