I love Dwell.

I love Dwell so much I wish I could actually live in it.

It’s possible I love Dwell just a little too much.

It’s possible my relationship with Dwell is becoming unhealthy.

I love Dwell because it appeals to me sense of not being surrounded by extraneous stuff. I am, remember, the person who can go to Costco and buy only the exact things on my list. I can (and do) go to places like Target and not impulse-buy. I just don’t have the time, patience or energy to get bogged down in defining my self-worth by the brand of blender I buy.

And yet, Dwell hypnotizes me and makes me susceptible to advertising I wouldn’t otherwise even read, let alone spend time thinking about.

For instance – a recent ad for Adobe products. I have nothing against Adobe products. I like photoshop, I just never use it anymore. Because I have no real reason to. Adobe doesn’t make the audio products I need and I don’t need any of their products to write. I have no reason to fetishize anything from this company. Nevertheless, I spent a lot of time staring at this ad:

A man stares out his office window. He’s tired or a bit haggard or filled with deep despair or extremely constipated. I can’t tell. Just suffice to say his facial expression and posture conveys neither contentment nor comfort.

On the facing page is this text:

Every once in a while you’re the first one in the office.
Not because you got up early.
But because you never left.

Introducing Adobe Creative Suite 2. Our most indispensible software, upgraded, integrated and built to work as one. So when an idea finally hits you, and it will, you’ll have all the tools you need.
Creative Suite 2. It’s everything but the idea.
Better by Adobe.

I looked at that ad and I felt this deep, deep longing for Adobe Creative Suite 2. I felt it was going to change my life. I was bereft not to have Adobe Creative Suite 2 because I might get An Idea and not have the tools to, uh, do whatever it is I’m supposed to do once I get the idea. Because this is the thing: I’m never the first one in the office. I don’t even work in an office. Plus, I don’t identify with the sad, constipated Asian man, and I certainly don’t want to be a sad, constipated Asian man.

Right now, in fact, the only tools I actually need are paper and a writing implement, everything else is gravy.

Hell, I don’t even know what Adobe Creative Suite 2 is or what it does.

And yet…Without it, I am incomplete.

That’s an effective ad.