They opened a Bath and Body Works near my house. It’s changed things for me. I’ve always enjoyed their candles, their three wicks can’t be beat when it comes to Halloween and Christmas. Ordering candles for those seasons has been a part of my seasonal tradition for a while now. As I get older I don’t like going to the mall as much as I did when I was younger, I’m comfortably and happily aging into my “old man yells at cloud” stage of life.
However, this new store is not in a mall, it’s in a shopping center. I can go and investigate candles in peace. This has changed things for me. I don’t order online from them as much as I once did, and now I find that I’m going to the store at least once or twice a month to get candles. It’s a snowball, really. It began with candles and now I’ve added hand soaps into the mix. My non-existent wife, Sheila, typically just buys whatever dial is on sale and puts it in the bathrooms of our home.
It began with some soaps being on sale. $4 for soap that smells like a blue raspberry snow cone? Perfect for July! Slowly, I began to replace all the dial soaps in the house with various scents. Sheila didn’t notice at first. But when all 27 bathrooms in our home had the soaps changed out, she began to suspect something was up. The soap wasn’t that big a deal. Sheila was more surprised I had bought enough to fill up all of our bathrooms with new soaps.
It was the three-wick candles where things began to take a turn. There were always a few in that one hall closet where we keep our linens. You know the one. It has that top shelf that’s a sort of “catch-all” for other home things that you’re not quite sure where else to put them. We also kept the extra tubes of Toothpaste there. That kind of spot. It’s where we’d store extra scented candles. We have always had a few on hand. They’re so pleasant and help set a wonderful mood when you’re having company over.
You see I signed up for the sales emails. So now I know when the things I like the most are going to be on sale. One day, Sheila went to that hall closet to put away some toothpaste she had bought for future use, only to open the closet and find it full of three-wick candles from Bath and Body Works. She was taken slightly aback by this discovery. “Oh, maybe Andy moved all the candles into one closet?” She later told me she thought to herself upon seeing this sight.
Undaunted by this, Sheila went into our kitchen and decided to put the extra toothpaste in our medicine cupboard. Sheila opened the cupboard door and was now very surprised to see it too was full of three-wick candles from Bath and Body Works. A sinking feeling washed over her, with trepidation and unease, Sheila walked over to another cabinet in the kitchen and opened it. It was full of candles.
She went to another door, where we usually keep baking supplies. Candles. Sheila then began to frantically run to every closet and/or storage cabinet in our home to find them all full of three-wick candles from Bath and Body Works. Shiela was now in a panic. How much money had I spent on candles? Where was all our stuff? Did I toss it all into a dumpster somewhere? Shelia also wasn’t sure where I was in the house when suddenly she was hit by the very strong aroma of “Sweater Weather.”
Sheila followed her nose and it led her down to the basement. The lights were off down there, but she had no trouble finding her way down the stairs as the room was full of light coming from 30 three-wick “Sweater Weather” candles. I was sitting in the center of all this, on the floor, my eyes closed, saying over and over “I am the fall. I am the fall.” Sheila turned on the lights and asked what in the world was going on?
I revealed to her all of our cabinet possessions were out in the garage, I hadn’t tossed them. I also showed her how much money I had saved buying all these candles on sale. It didn’t impress her, she made me return all the ones I hadn’t lit. Sheila now goes with me each time I go by Bath and Body Works. I’m just glad to have regained enough trust from her that she no longer puts the shock collar on me before we go in the store. See you next week.
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