By R.S. Rodriguez

Kudos to management at the Camarillo Outlet stores.  Somehow, they have managed to make the dreaded shopping experience somewhat tolerable.  I suppose it behooves me to state a reason or two for my dislike of the process.

A Fashionista, I am not.  I couldn’t care less which styles or designers are considered hip or avant-garde.  If the cotton in a fabric flannel shirt were to maintain its integrity for say a decade, I’d be perfectly content wearing said flannel throughout that decade.  Unfortunately, shirts wear at the elbows, jeans at the knees and hips widen and narrow depending on how I am able to manage the waist.  When these things happen, I realize I have no choice but to head to the retailers.

How painstaking a process it is to shop, especially in this world of ever-increasingly narrow parking spots (“Let’s cram as many suckers in as we can.”).  Yet I maintain my cool and manage my phobias.  I enjoy people but so dislike the process of walking through racks and looking for clothing in stacks.  How I dread the process of schlepping shirts and jeans to a claustrophobic dressing room only to be disappointed when my choices do not fit and I have to return to those dreaded racks and stacks, starting the painful process all over again.  Returning to the dressing room, I sometimes feel I am a dishonored pirate walking a plank with sharks circling at the ready below.

Perhaps I am cynical.  I tend to mute all television commercials and reach for the volume knob on the radio if an ad interrupts the music I am listening to or the point of view on talk radio.  How dare these marketing conglomerates and cartels dare try to manipulate my mind and checking account.

Yet the Camarillo Outlet stores lessen the pain.  As stated earlier, I hate to shop but I like people.  Given, I feel somewhat claustrophobic when too many people are jammed into a small space- especially a retail store!  (I have no idea how people are able to manage their collective cools during Black Fridays).

The Camarillo Outlet stores somehow manage to attract suckers- I mean shoppers- from all over the world.  While walking along the halls of these retailers, when cannot but notice the dozens of different languages spoken and the different cultures represented in those former agricultural fields.  There are always enthusiastic and gleeful shoppers from Asia, Europe, Scandinavia, Latin America and Africa.  It’s an international smorgasbord of shoppers.  And they appear to be so bloody happy and enthusiastic to allot some of their vacation time to shopping.  I just don’t understand.

Management at the Camarillo Outlet stores has been extremely creative and effective in informing international shoppers of its existence.  They have gotten the word out.  I assume thousands upon thousands of ads in magazines on flights from abroad are common.  This international flavor helps a bit in taking away my dislike of shopping.  If people are willing to travel 8,000 to participate in the process I suppose I can travel eight miles to do the same.

I still hate to shop, though.