Dave Viner's Weblog

Bra shopping

This past weekend, Diana had to go bra shopping and, since it got rolled in with our weekend walk, I was there too. I'm sure most guys who have been in a relationship have, at some point, had to go bra shopping and I am certain this has got to be one of the worst positions for any guy.

So, there we are walking through the bra section of Nordstrom's. I help finding the bras in the right size like all the other good husbands and significant others. Diana goes into the dressing room and the real difficulty starts. There I am, a thirty-something guy with greying hair, wandering alone among the lingerie section of the store. There's nothing I can do that doesn't make me look crazy in some fashion. I can't leave the section because Diana's in the fitting room. So I have to stay close by. If I look interested in the bras and panties, then I appear as some kind of weird pervert wandering around staring and fondling the goods. If I look uninterested, then I look like some kind of stalker/uni-bomber type who's aimlessly wandering around the women's underwear section waiting for my next victim.

I wander in the section for what seems like an eternity. Finally I wander across the walkway into the women's athletic equipment section. Not that I had anything to look at there, but it seems a little more "normal", and I don't feel utterly and completely self-conscious as dozens of women walk by... I'm sure the women don't think anything of me, but I could swear they glare at me with eyes questioning: "Are you a perv? or a stalker?"

I swear this is the worst lose-lose situation a guy can be in. I really don't think there's anything good to do or any action that doesn't make a guy look like some kind of maniac.

Oh well, at least we were in Nordstrom's and not Victoria's Secret. (Although everytime we've gone to Victoria's Secret, I've always found some other guys wandering alone - which leads to the eye contact and nod of understanding which says "Yes, I'm normal. You're normal. Let's just pretend this will end in one second and that this is completely normal.") Thankfully the trip was pretty quick and Barnes and Noble held a peanut butter cup cookie for us afterwards.