Seven Vouchers, One Identity Crisis: What Happened When My Groupon History Came for Me
Photo: person glassblowing workshop molten glass beginner class, via theglasshub.com
Every purchase is a small autobiography. Nobody tells you this when you're entering your credit card at 11:47 p.m., but it's true. And nothing writes a more damning memoir than a Groupon history, because a Groupon isn't just a purchase — it's a purchase of a future self, one you then abandon like a rental car in an airport lot.
When I scrolled through my account last month, I discovered I had bought seven deals for things I had never once done, considered doing, or could explain to another adult. A glassblowing workshop. A haunted pub crawl. A trapeze class (bold). A pasta-making seminar in a strip mall. A two-hour kayak rental. A candle-making experience subtitled "Unleash Your Inner Artisan," which is a threat, not a tagline. And a sip-and-paint, which every person in America owns and no person in America has attended.
So I gave myself two weeks. All seven vouchers. No mercy. What follows is the field report.
Glassblowing: I Am Not Hot Enough, Emotionally or Otherwise
The instructor had forearms like a blacksmith in a novel and the patience of a kindergarten teacher on the last day of school. I did not. Within ten minutes I had produced what he gently called "a blob with ambition." It was, technically, molten glass. It was, spiritually, a mistake you could display on a shelf.
Here's what nobody tells you about glassblowing: it's a team sport with a furnace, and your classmates — three retirees from a book club — will outperform you instantly and kindly. One of them made a swan. A SWAN. My contribution looked like the swan's divorce.
The Groupon version of me believed I was the kind of person with a craft. The couch version of me knows I am the kind of person with a mug. The gap between those two men is approximately 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit.
The Haunted Pub Crawl: My Fear of Ghosts Was No Match for My Fear of Icebreakers
The 2021 me who bought this ticket was clearly going through something. The experience was two parts local history, one part ghost story, and four parts standing in a humid basement while a man named Denny asked us to "open ourselves to the energy."
Denny had a device called a spirit box, which is a radio that scans frequencies and — according to Denny — lets the dead speak. According to me, it lets the dead say a lot of words that sound like "shhh" and "maybe." Denny asked if anyone felt a presence. I felt the presence of the $29 I spent, and honestly, that's haunting enough.
But here's the twist: it was genuinely fun. Not because of ghosts. Because twelve strangers were forced to be weird together in a basement, and weirdness shared is the last true community in America.
Trapeze: The Voucher Lied About My Upper Body
I want to be clear that past-me bought a TRAPEZE class. Not a yoga class. Not a stretching seminar. Trapeze. The thing circus people do. The deal said "beginner friendly," which is the single most generous use of the word "friendly" in the history of commerce.
I hung from a bar for eleven seconds. The instructor, a woman with the grip strength of a tow truck, said "great job," which I have decided to believe. My arms filed a formal complaint the next morning. My core has not been heard from since.
The Sip-and-Paint: The One That Felt Like a Trap
Every voucher so far taught me something about who I was pretending to be. The sip-and-paint taught me the darkest truth of all: I actually am the person who buys sip-and-paint vouchers, and I will buy another one. I painted a sunset. It was bad. I loved it. I have not ruled out a gallery.
The Kayak, The Pasta, The Candle
The kayak was perfect and I'm furious about it, because it means the voucher-me might be real. The pasta class was held between a nail salon and a tax preparer, and I made a ravioli that tasted like ambition. The candle class gave me a wax that smells like "Autumn Porch," which is a place that does not exist, in a home that now smells like it does.
The Audit
Two weeks, seven vouchers, one conclusion: the person buying Groupons at midnight isn't a fantasy. He's a draft. A rough cut. The couch version of me is just the director who keeps saying "we'll fix it in post."
Well, post has arrived. The swan's divorce is on my shelf. My arms are ruined. Denny's spirit box says "maybe." And I have already, against all advice, bought a voucher for blacksmithing.
The asteroid of self-improvement is coming, and this time I'm doing the montage.
