dilemma

At work, I sit next to the women who run the wine club. Every day, I hear them on the phone. They take orders from club members, give advice on when to open a bottle and help people navigate our country's complex and very annoying wine shipping laws.

I also hear them when a club member cancels a membership and when a member's credit card has expired and they have to call the person repeatedly to get the new information so they can send the next shipment of wines.

These co-workers get pretty sad when a member leaves and pretty frustrated when they can't update someone's account.

Which makes me feel like an asshole.

Because this is exactly what I have been doing for the past year to one of the wine clubs to which I supposedly belong. My card expired awhile ago, and the poor club manager has been calling me since last July to get the new numbers.

I should know better. I do know better. I should quit being so passive-aggressive and just call the winery and tell them that I am getting married / I already have too much wine (see the photo above -- that's not even half of it) / my cat had diarrhea recently, which resulted in an unexpected vet bill and therefore I need to put my club membership on hold.

And yet I can't bring myself to pick up the phone. I think this is because I'm afraid I'll feel guilty for not supporting said winery (they are small, they are family-owned, they don't have much three-tier distribution) and end up forking over the credit card digits.

Damn these tough economic times.