“This Shirt? On My Back? Here, Let Me Help You With the Buttons…”
I just gave fifteen of my last eighteen dollars in cash to some braless canvasser. Why do I do this? Why? Not that I don’t care about global warming, I do. Down with global warming! Rah! Rah! But I don’t have an extra fifteen dollars. Especially not to shell out to someone who begins her every response with “cool,” and who put my fifteen dollars into a crumpled plastic baggie that I am willing to bet considerably more than fifteen dollars used to have weed in it.
She gave me her pitch, I nodded sagely, repressed a guffaw of disbelief when she suggested I pledge 20-30 dollars a month, and then, with a sad smile, informed her that I could not afford to contribute at the present time.
“Do you support the position?” she asked, waggling her clipboard.
I blinked.
“Yes,” I said, “I do.”
“Cool. Some people who can’t afford a large pledge are giving ten or fifteen dollars as a symbolic donation.”
I wanted to say that if money changed hands, these were actual donations, not merely “symbolic” ones, but instead I said “Great!” and ran upstairs. I snatched a ten and three ones from my purse, leaving myself a five for tomorrow’s lunch.
“This is all the cash I have,” I said when I returned, “Thirteen dollars.”
“Cool. But it’d be great if you had just like, two more dollars, because fifteen dollars is actually our base membership level.”
I stared at her. She stared back. Her breasts stared in opposite directions.
“I’ll see what I can do,” I mumbled finally, and slumped back upstairs, beaten.
I stood in the living room for a few minutes before returning with the five dollar bill. I wanted to give the impression that I was searching for the money. After all, I had said that thirteen dollars was all the cash I had, and I couldn’t let this stranger, whom I would never see again, know that I was lying, could I? She might go home to her roommates, and, pulling a joint from where it was tucked securely under the flap of her left breast, tell the story of the stupid girl she had guilted into financial ruin. As she spoke, destructive smoke particles would spiral upwards, enshrouding the planet and undoing my fifteen dollars worth of environmental activism.
Anyway, the point is: Don’t answer the doorbell without a spine. Better yet, don’t answer it at all.
21 Comments
When you gave her money and she asked for more I think I would have taken back what I gave her and shut the door. That just seems kind of rude to me???
Take care
Earnest young college students have a way of getting my $$$ too.
Hmmm… just blame it on the illness. I hope the fact that you could make it to the door at all (even without your spine) is a sign that you’re starting to feel a bit more human!
ugh. i just got suckered in by this welfare to work woman who came by selling magazines. i figured, what the heck, a magazine subscription is what? ten bucks? next thing i know she’s all, we only have 2 year subscriptions and you really need to buy 2 magazines and next thing i knew she was asking for 90 dollars right there! i balked and said, uh, can i just give you a $10 donation instead? and she’s all, sure!
my husband said i got suckered and she probably wasn’t really selling magazines anyway, and i was all, but she had this stuff and he says, what stuff? a clipboard? a couple of xerox copies? good point. hrmph.
I can’t stand the magazine sales. Ugh. It makes me feel so guilty. I actually saw one of those guys in my neighborhood last year and hid out in my house when he rang my bell.
I can imagine I’d have told a braless pot smoker to take whatever cause she was selling and stick it up her . . . well, that I wasn’t interested.
Trying to figure out if the flapping boobs hurt or help the cause…
They always get my money. I just feel so badly for them; it sucks having to go door to door for any reason. However, I seem to have developed a reputation as a sucker (go figure) and last month a homeless man came to our door asking for money. Luckily I didn’t have any cash…but I did offer to drive him to the hospital. My husband was ready to kill me, and has forbidden me from opening the door. Not that it has helped much.
Oh they pretty much always get me, too. No spine AT ALL, particularly with a guilt complex.
I’m so keen to go back and comment all over your wedding post, but I thikn everyone said everything. Except maybe fireworks. We blew the budget on them, they were magical, and I am so happy we did. Also, don’t let the Actually do the music unless he’s really taking it seriously. Mine didn’t and the DJ was a DISASTER!
As a former canvasser here are a few other indications of a ‘good door’:
1. door painted red
2. volvo in driveway
3. bumper stickers
4. veggies growing in front yard
5. a no soliciting sign
I loved canvassing - met good people. My goal was to reach quota and find a good dinner on turf.
ps I would always advise my crew to dress to fit the neighborhood ;)
These people always get my money - I have a hard time saying no to people.
Oh, UGH the boob flap. If there’s one thing I remember in my daily prayers, its to mention to God that I really really don’t want to be left with flappy boobs after pregnancy. Unless I can just tuck things under them instead of carrying a purse. That actually might be useful.
OK, just grossed myself out.
There is a warm comfortable place in heaven for you with on tap hot chocolate and enormous pillow sized marshmallows…oh wait hang on, you only gave the ‘base membership’ didn’t you? Ok, that’s some floorspace and a damp sponge.
That’s it exactly. I’ve taken to not answering the door to random visitors lest I whip out my checkbook for every cause from saving the wild cabbages to blind midget voting rights.
Wait. When you gave her the five, did you have to ask her for your three ones back?
I’m usually the braless one in this type of transaction. I stand sluched over as if that’s going to hide my unattractive sagging bosum!
After I bought some really expensive household cleaner from some guy who supposedly was trying to pay for college in Atlanta (not sure why he was selling in Mpls), Husband now answers the door. He’s much better at saying no. By the way, have never used very expensive cleaner. It’s currently collecting dust in the closet!
Yeah, them and the Greenpeace people. They ALWAYS get me with the Taco Bell line.
I wonder if a similar grassroots campaign to fund my IF treatments would work?
Is it impolite to talk about old posts on new posts? Sorry, I’m usually a lurker.
But wait! With the lexapro! The ungentle lexapro?!?! What do you mean? Or what did you mean, two posts ago.
It made me gulp because I started taking the stuff 6 mths ago and everything that had once been dark became tra la la…
but then I tried to get off.
I suppose you don’t really want to discuss my moodswings in your comments section. Harumph. I will now go and search your archives for clues.
Oh Alexa, you crack me up! I generally don’t answer the door unless I know who it is. I can’t say no either, so I prefer to pretend I’m not home!
As ever, dear A, you have us in stitches, trying NOT to think of your hard-earned cash financing a joint…or two…or three!!! (Whatever they cost in the current market.)
You are 110% right–please do not answer the door! Period. No exceptions.
You don’t know the person on the other side isn’t an unregistered sex offender hoping to be sent back to prison by committing yet another felony (yes; very scary thought)–or, some driven Jehovah’s Witness wanting to turn you into a driven Jehovah’s Witness (apologies to any JW’s out there, but frankly y’all really are pests).
Ask your friends and relatives to always call before coming over, and you’re good to go.
And…given November is looming, think of the political door-to-door encounters you’ll spare yourself…not to mention trying to avoid looking at unfettered mammary glands that were likely cynically allowed to, er, ‘roam free’ in the hopes of raising funds from some of the males of our species.
The guy who used to live downstairs from me told me how he used to get rid of door-to-door canvassers–from salespeople to Jehovah’s Witnesses: He’d strip down to his underpants and crack open a beer before opening the door. Then he’d just stand there, scratching his nads and slurping while they went into their pitches. He claimed that most would become alarmed and/or uncomfortable and wrap it up pretty quickly, never to return. (I can’t say I’d try it myself, not having any nads and all, but it’s something to keep in mind…)
I am soooo late to this commenting party…but I am no longer allowed to answer the door because I end up buying magazines or talking to Jehovah’s witnesses for an hour.
Last time, as the people were walking up to me while I sat on my porch swing I said quite clearly, “I’m not interested in buying anything.” They started the spiel anyway and finally I had to say AGAIN how I wasn’t buying anything and they left but they were giving me really pissy looks and one of them had a tear drop tattooed under his eye. It didn’t hit me till later that I totally pissed off a gangbanger.
So now? I don’t answer the door.