Still all these years later, shopping lessons continue

It’s getting more difficult to conduct a routine of our daily life. This COVID-19 thing has kept us confined to the point we’ve viewed most of old GUNSMOKE TV programs and seems to have moved beyond to where we have now seen reruns of reruns. If that isn’t bad enough a new hurdle has surfaced.
Over the past few years I’ve given up trying to figure birthday and Christmas gifts for the Betterhalf and have told her to just go shopping and pick her own gift -- with no strings attached. Once that unconditional statement worked well, but now it has hit a stumbling block.
The Betterhalf said there is really nothing she needs. “And besides I just don’t feel like shopping for myself when you need shoes,” she said. However, she apparently had a scheme in mind.
The scheme surfaced when I made a comment my feet hurt from too much walking and my shoes are pretty well worn out. She exclaimed, “Well, tomorrow WE should go get you a new pair of shoes!” That set the stage for dragging me from our house and taking me to an area shoe store. 
I hate to shop out of town by going to a mall, but had no choice to replace my old comfy pair. The shoe store happened to be in a location where we would “conveniently” walk through a department store’s women’s fashion sector. 
The shoe store didn’t have my shoe size, meaning I left with no new shoes. Adjourning back to the car we again had passed through the department store women’s fashion sector. The Betterhalf didn’t break stride and when we arrived back at the car I gave a sigh of relief. Moments later the Betterhalf’s plan was exposed and I was placed on alert.
 “If you don’t want to go, I think I’ll go shopping tomorrow”, she said. Somehow, I don’t remember my shoe search being mentioned in her overall plan. I do figure it appears shopping for her own gifts might be back on track. 
The Betterhalf has clarified her thoughts. “Need and want are two different things” and is emphasizing her belief that she doesn’t need anything, but still wants.
Woe is me!

RL Furse  is publisher emeritus of the News-Register