GAP apple
With two days remaining in the land that uses dollars, I took a stroll to a nearby CVS in order to fetch my girlfriend a stick of flavored lip balm that she requested. But instead I spotted a GAP, to which I had a $20 free coupon in my pocket. Ohh, let me check the hours (I had planned to go the next day)… maybe I should just go now… I checked the time. I’d be late for the happy hour… it's out of the way… OK, let’s do it. I walked in, started browsing, tried on some shirts and selected my $20 worth- a polo tee and a pair of grey camo boxer briefs. At the register I saw a tub of flavored lip balms. There was apple in a shiny pink tube. Oh perfect! (she has an apple tattoo) I check the price: $4.50. I could buy four sticks of Blistex at CVS for that price… but would there be apple? “Is this really $4.50?” I insulted the cashier. “Yes.” I put it back. That’s outrageous. “Would you like your receipt in the bag?” “Uh, yeah… is there… is that it?” I was confused that I made it to exactly $20 with no change or balance. “You’re all set.” CVS should have different flavors, right? I haven’t checked grocery stores… besides, $4.50 is way too much. But apple had entered my mind. That’s not a common flavor. I left the GAP hopeful that CVS would be the answer.
When I arrived at CVS the next day, I found cherry, NEW limited edition cherry, original, and a tropical trio… but no apple. Should I just get tropical? I held it in my hand, put it back, circled the store and picked it up again. The price was $3 for three sticks: melon blend, tropical splash and some other teenie-bopper-fluorescent-regret-of-not-buying-apple-when-I-had-the-chance. She’ll never know that I had the chance to buy apple… tropical is still fruity. Memories wafted in my mind of the Victoria’s Secret spiced berry lip gloss I bought after haven forgotten that she wanted apple (and actually requested lip balm as opposed to gloss). Would I actually go back to the GAP on the other side of town? I bought the tropical trio, but it was too late: apple pervaded my thoughts. I didn’t really need the shirt or the boxer briefs; I could’ve bought the balm with my coupon and not paid anything for it. Relative to what I was receiving from the transaction at GAP, $4.50 wasn’t a bad price. I imagined approaching the same cashier, placing the small cylinder on the counter ashamed and subdued. It would’ve been $4.75 with tax I bet. Chagrined, I surveyed my GAP receipt and found another receipt stapled to the back which read, “Fill in this survey and get 20% off of your next purchase.” Here’s my chance! I could get nearly $1 off of the marked up price and that way feel more validated by making the extra effort. But costs were disappearing from the reality… the tropical trio was a mere $1.50 less than the expensive GAP apple, which by its weight in time I spent searching and draining my mental reserves, had exceeded this cost by several orders of magnitude. Thus I accepted my quandary. Finally admitting that apple was the standard and apple was what I wanted for my girlfriend, I filled out the fifteen minute survey relating to the quality of GAP Mens’ trousers, received my 20% off coupon code, and planned to make the purchase.
The GAP was out of the way on the morning of my departure, but my friend was driving me to the airport. “Hey, do you think we could make a quick stop downtown? I want to grab something for my girlfriend,” “Sure, man. What is it?” I reluctantly explained, “It’s this special flavor of lip balm that only GAP has… it’s apple.” Next to the national mall we hit traffic. “What’s going on?” “It looks like the road to downtown is blocked off… we’d have to go down to the Lincoln memorial and turn around.” I thought of the time change the night before, then blamed it for me missing the chance to ride a bike to buy the lip balm that morning. It was two hours prior to departure of the flight. Forlornly holding my discount coupon in hand, I said, “Oh, okay, don’t worry about it… it’s no big deal.” I wondered if I could order it online. What’s the shipping on a $4.75 - $.80 discount = $3.95 tube of apple lip balm? Do they ship internationally? “Maybe you’ll find it at the airport,” my friend offered. My head turned as we passed the red flares of the blocked of road to downtown. What more could I do? At the airport, my eyes purveyed the kiosks ravenously: White House Chapstick, cherry blossom lip balm, Blistex original… no apple. In a final plea, I asked the Cameroonian saleswoman of the fragrance duty free shop, “Do you have lip balm?” “There is only this.” She replied, pointing to a sparkling blue glass bottle with a silver cap. “It good for lips, make soft. Twelve dollars.” “OK, bye.” I turned to leave. She kept talking, “This for lips, make soft.” I walked out.
In my luggage hid a colorful trio of lip balms that would make an excellent gift, but not the one I wanted, not the standard I had set. But I neglected the idea that she could potentially enjoy the tropical sticks more than the apple. Or what if the GAP apple just plain sucked? That was a possibility. Several months later, armed with a fresh coupon, I returned to the GAP and brought my selections to the register. I smiled at the wide-mouth plastic bucket on the counter, plucked out a shiny stick of apple lip balm and confidently placed it upright in front of the cashier, “And this, please.” I paid my balance, left the store, opened the plastic casing, removed the cap and applied the balm to my lips as if they could taste an unknown ingredient of sweetness in the ointment. The signals received by my brain were the familiar smell, color and texture of Chapstick original, with not even a hint of apple.